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\ I I I I I I I I II I I I I I I I I performing meteorological analysis and calculations in daily operations. The program is capable of projecting several other rawinsonde sites onto the same chart so atmospheric comparisons among surrounding locations at can be seen. Rawinsondes are balloon-borne weather-measuring instruments launched twice a day, at 7 a.m. and again at 7 p.rn. They contain sensors measuring atmospheric pressure, temperature and humidity changes and transmit radio signals to a ground tracking station. Winds peed and direction with height are also determined. On the WKWMP the rawinsonde data from the Dodge City National Weather Service are used most often to determine what is a "representative" atmosphere for our area. For the northern target area the North Platte, Nebraska rawinsonde site is often more representative of that area. These data are nearly indispensable in making good short-term forecasts of 12 hours, or less. Another service we use routinely to access weather information is the DIRECT USER ACCESS TERMINAL SYSTEM (DUATS). DUATS is a government-funded weather and flight planning service available to all pilots which is accessed via computer terminal and modem. DUATS has replaced most of the old Flight Service System (FSS) offices. Years back the FSS had ubiquitous offices at most fair-sized airports around the USA, now there are only a handful in the USA. Other software can process the weather data collected via DUATS among them are forecasts, hourly surface observations, weather warnings, forecast discussions and radar summaries. Normally, by 10:30 - 10:45 a.m. WKWMP meteorologists have prepared their daily operational weather forecasts and are discussing it over the telephone; also they dedcide what the seeding strategy will be for the day. When finished with the conference, they each disseminate their forecasts and seeding strategy to the pilots in their assigned areas. The information is normally disseminated to the pilots by telephone or pager between 11 :00 and 12:00 a.m., CDT. Operational requirements, administrative work, etc., are arranged either before or after the dissemination of the , forecast. The flow chart on the following page, Fig. 4, shows our daily operational schedule. B. WEATHER SURVEILLANCE - RADAR, SATELLITE, TV AND VISUAL Watching for sudden, severe weather development and being aware of the general suitability of the likelihood of severe weather is continuous throughout the day during the season, irrespective of the daily forecast. Helping in this effort is the continuously-fed stream of weather data from DIN which provides updated regional radar composites every 15 minutes (with its IS-minute delay). Since DIN programming allows us to put into mo~ion both satellite imagery of clouds and radar composites; it's a quick way of checking for, or tracking, storms over the larger regional area of which we are a part. Although TV provides us with a means of obtaining a local area forecasters' analysis, breaking weather warnings and NEXRAD radar displays, TV is not relied upon as much as is our own local sources of information such as the WKWMP radars, personal observations, Internet radar information, satellite imagery, wind profiler displays and DIN. 15