U.S. Department of Commerce

WISDOM[Weather In-Situ Deployment Optimization Method]

Alexander E. MacDonald, NOAA Research DAA for LCIJustyna Nicinska, WISDOM Program Manager

LT Richard E. Hester Jr., NOAA/R/ERSL Associate Director Yuanfu Xie, NOAA/R/ESRL/GSD

Russell B. Chadwick, NOAA/R/ESRL/GSD

2010 COCOM SMO ConferenceMarch 25, 2010

U.S. Department of Commerce

2 Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research - WISDOM Program

- NOAA Organization, OAR, OMAO, NOAA Corps

- WISDOM Concept

- Operations 2008 and 2009

- Measuring Data Impact

- Future Directions

- Collaboration Ideas

Outline

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Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research - WISDOM Program 3

Department of Commerce

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

Oceanic and Atmospheric

Research

NationalEnvironmentalSatellite, Data

And InformationService

NationalOceanService

NationalWeather Service

NationalMarine

FisheriesService

Program Planning and

Integration

Office of Marine and

AviationOperations

Aircraft OperationsCenter

Marine OperationsCenters

CommissionedPersonnel Center

NOAA DiveCenter

~ 321 officers~ 1400 personnel~ $200M/year

NOAA Organization

Office of Marine and Aviation Operations (OMAO) 4

OMAO, NOAA Corps - History

• 1807 – Jefferson’s Survey of the Coast, first science agency, to chart “every mile of navigable water”

• First New York Harbor chart, automated tide gauges, “Red, Right, Return” buoyage system

• Worked with attached Army & Naval officers• Civil War – non-uniformed surveyors in jeopardy

of execution• 1917 - U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey• World War I and World War II - intelligence

gatherers, surveying battlefields and landing sites, navigating troop transports, other technical roles

• 1965-1970 – ESSA Corps under the Environmental Science Services Administration

• 1970 NOAA and NOAA Corps – new missions

5 Office of Marine and Aviation Operations (OMAO) 5

Minneapolis(2)

AOC Tampa, FL(10)

Monterey, CA (1)

TWIN OTTER (1)

P-3 (3) SHRIKE COMMANDER

KING AIR 350ER

JET PROP COMMANDER

Manassas, VA(1)

SHRIKE COMMANDER

MISSIONSCharting and Mapping

Fisheries Research

Hurricane Research

Environmental Assessment

MISSIONSCharting and Mapping

Fisheries Research

Hurricane Research

Environmental Assessment

OMAO, NOAA Corps - 13 Aircraft

6 Office of Marine and Aviation Operations (OMAO) 6

PASCAGOULA(3)

SAN DIEGO (1)

MOC-ATLANTIC(1)

CHARLESTON (2)

DELAWARE II

GORDON GUNTER

DAVID STARR JORDAN

NANCY FOSTER

RONALD H. BROWN

KODIAK , AK (1)

Nautical Charting

Fisheries Research

Oceanographic Research

Coastal Monitoring

Ocean Exploration

Ocean Climate Monitoring

MISSIONS

KA’IMIMOANA

OSCAR ELTON SETTE

HI’IALAKAI

RAINIER

McARTHUR II

FAIRWEATHER

HONOLULU (3)

THOMAS JEFFERSON

PISCES

MILLER FREEMAN

OMAO, NOAA Corps - 19 Ships,9 Home Ports

MOC-PACIFIC(4)

Temporary Homeports:

OKEANOS EXPLORER

HONOLULU, HI

HENRY BIGELOW

KETCHIKAN , AK (1)

WOODS HOLE (1)

DYSON


The Hurricane Track Problem

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WISDOM

An ensemble of NWP forecastsfor the track of Hurricane Rita

WISDOM vision is future 4-day forecastsas good or better than current 3-day forecasts

Improving forecasts of the synoptic environment – the “steering flow”

has been an important factor for increasing accuracy of track forecasts


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Flood the data poor region with enough balloons to improve forecasts by one day.

The WISDOM solution

The WISDOM program aims to improve the hurricane track prediction in the 3 to 6 day period before landfall by providing wind and atmospheric data over poorly observed areas of the Atlantic basin.

9 Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research - WISDOM Program 9

WISDOM Concept

balloon deployment trainingOctober 2008, Miami FL

Super pressure non-elastic “tetroon” to drift 2-3 days at constant design altitudes (5K ft and 12K ft)

Essential 100 g payload components are GPS receiver and RF transmitter

Wind is calculated from position data

2008 payload

2009 payload


• ETC’s GPS RF Tag:proprietary, software configurable radio technology

• Data transmitted real time via UHF FLEETSATCOM to ETC’s ground station

• Then via internet to the MADIS servers at NOAA/ESRL.

• Operational centers receive real time data via MADIS

WISDOM Concept


Lots of Partners - Philosophy of cooperative observers, data sharing, mutual benefits per established practices of national and international met service and WMO

Interagency SponsorsNOAA R/ESRL, R/ARL, /NWSDHS S&T DirectorateDOD Air Force Weather AgencyDOD JCS J63

University PartnersNorthern Gulf Institute MSUUniversity of MiamiTexas A&M Corpus ChristiSimeon Fongang Ecole Superieure Polytechnique Universite, Senegal

International Meteorological Services PartnersCaribbean Institute of Meteorology and HydrologyBermuda Weather Service

Private Sector PartnersNear Space CorporationEngenium TechnologiesRaytheon

WISDOM Concept

Feds, private sector folks, university employees, grad students


Annual Cycle - R&D, Production, Field Preps

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FEB – APR: scope the range of efforts for this year, initiate reimbursable funding process

MAR: federal government gets a budget?

MAY: interagency funds transfers completed

MAY: contract let for balloon & payload production, deployment site liaison activities

AUG: balloon deployment training

SEP-OCT: active field test window (~30 days)

NOV-DEC: stand down, data impacts, report out

YEAR-ROUND: Program Development, OSSE modeling development, some engineering consults

Balloon deployment training August 2009, Waveland MS. Lead by university consortium partner Northern Gulf Institute


Active Test Season Operations

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Daily watch routine:

throughout the period: deployment teams are “on call”

1200Z: designated ESRL forecaster consults latest NWP guidance and ensemble spreads, issues daily “stand by” or “stand down” via email and web posting, automated trajectory forecasts are run

1400Z: ESRL decision team consults forecaster, balloon trajectory forecasts, issues specific balloon deployment instructions, issues courtesy NOTAMS

1600Z: deployment teams confirm receiptand execute

(30 days SEP-OCT)

7 day predicted trajectories from GFS (green) & FIM (red) model runs vs actual trajectory (yellow) for balloon W000139 launched from Waveland MS.


Active Test Season Operations

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Intermittent launch procedure:

- assemble 2+ person team at pre-loaded rental van2 hard suit cases2 helium tanksBalloonsPayloadsvoice communications w/ NOAA/ESRL

- drive to pre-designated deployment site- turn on payloads for sat lock, Tx/Rx tests- inflate balloon per instructions for designated altitude, adjusted for local pressure- conduct Tx/Rx test- attach payload- release balloon- note low drift, tested in 20 mph winds

(30 days SEP-OCT)

Balloon deployment in MS.


WISDOM, with funding support from the DHS S&T, conducted a successful initial feasibility test during the 2008 hurricane season

• 10 Prototypes launched from Hawaii in August

• First Field Test w/ 19 balloons in October

• Altitudes- 12,000 & 26,000 ft

• Hurricane Paloma Launch - 57 balloons in November

2008 Proof of Concept Testing

First test deployment trajectories as of 10/29/08. Balloons were launched 10/18/08.

Big surprise – 10 day lifetimes


2008 Results

• Balloons successful maintained constant design altitudes

• Payloads successfully transmitted data to ESRL via DOD satellite

• Proved successful acquisition of in-situ wind data

• Determined feasible drifting balloon lifetimes

WISDOM balloon trajectories deployed around Hurricane Paloma, as located on Nov 12, 2008.


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Geographic and Altitude Track of WISDOM Balloon W000054, Launched November 7, 2008 as part of Hurricane Paloma campaign

2008 Results

A bigger surprise

• 20-day survivor • potential national

airspace concerns over Africa, Asia

• demonstrated need for termination devices


• Launched approximately 90 Balloons

• collected wind and pressure data• included flight termination

capability• Maintained 100 g weight of

payload• temp and relative humidity in

testing mode• Courtesy NOTAMs filed• 6 operational forecast centers

contacted regarding ingest of WISDOM data

2009 Pilot Operational Testing

WISDOM 2009 Launch Sites - 10 total

With support from DHS S&T, NOAA/NWS and Air Force/AFWA, WISDOM tested a pilot

operational cycle, and quantified data impact.


Senegal

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Bermuda

2009 Results

• Demonstrated international met services cooperation

• NGI developed “Balloon Tracker” real-time visualization

• Median flight 5-7 days, terminated past lat/lon boundary

• Demonstrated effectiveness of programmable cut-down devices

• WISDOM has demonstrated capability to target remote areas for in situ observations.

• The WISDOM Balloon System can provide thousands of data points at low cost (estimated at less than a dollar per data point). Selected launches throughout 2009,

colors based on launch location.


Nov 10, 2009 Tropical Storm (formerly hurricane) Ida location and numerous predicted locations; also WISDOM Balloon trajectories from releases originating in Corpus Christi TX.

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2009 Results

• Demonstrated proximity to hurricane / tropical storm (Ida)

• Demonstrated operational forecast centers received real-time vis ESRL MADIS• ECMWF• UK Met Office• NHC

• Demonstrated feasibility of field operations procedures


Observing System Simulation Experiments (OSSE)– ECMWF 13 month free forecast is used for OSSE “nature run”– Run forecasts w/ and w/out selected observations, measure impact

Offline, simulated experiments– Observing system is not yet built– “Synthetic obs” used to test impact on specific simulated hurricane cases– Data denial experiments, ensembles for robust statistics

Online, hind-cast and forecast experiments– forecast impact of WISDOM data, after the fact– expected impact of WISDOM data prior to balloon releases– releases and obs targeted to times & places of highest forecast impact

Measuring Data Impact


300 mb U-wind analysis impact of various observing systems, July-August 2005. Per GSI

assimilation system

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• Note in-situ impact at least as significant as satellite data

• Operational forecast centers ingest only 1-5% of satellite data

• “traditional” RAOB is among the highest impact



Analysis increment of wind speed from real time WISDOM STMAS analysis. Remnant of TS Ida is in northern MS.



• Expand volume to reach threshold 100-200 per storm– Number of release sites available for use– Number of balloons & payloads, inventoried and released – Support staff, administrative and int’l support and partners

• Technical Improvements– improve pressure, add temp and rel. humidity– additional balloon designs for altitudes 5K and 40K+– 2 way comms with no ground station

• Significant OSSE results– statistically significant quantified forecast impacts – observations targeting algorithm

• Prototype and test Aeroclipper concept by SEP2010– generic, disposable drop sonde type insertions from aircraft– for continuous readings in the eye over many days– pressure, air temperature, water temperature, wind speed and

direction

Future Directions


Assistance in accessing release sites, and/or releasing balloons– West Africa region releases are critical for tracking Cape Verde storms and hurricane genesis– Caribbean region releases from Central and South America would be a major benefit for late season

hurricanes typical for the region (note Ida example) – European release sites lower priority– Launch Operations are set up for easy equipment transfer and field deployments– Investigate USAID support as met services development capacity building activity

Prototype and test low-level balloon for dust storm forecast application– Requires new balloon design and fabrication, HI test range– Design requirements might overlap with those for 5K ft balloon and/or aeroclipper– Requires one-time dedicated funding, order of magnitude ~ $100K ~

On the Horizon– Expansion into Pacific Ocean, Indian Ocean– Expansion into routine ops for U.S. military met services worldwide– Transition to routine met service ops, WISDOM balloons as common as RAOBS

Collaboration Ideas


WISDOM[Weather In-Situ Deployment Optimization Method]

Points of Contact: http://wisdom.noaa.gov

[email protected]

http://wisdom.noaa.gov/

mailto:[email protected]

Documents

U.S. Department of Commerce