- THREE-DIMENSIONAL VARIATIONAL ANALYSIS OF AIRBORNE DOPPLER OBSERVATIONS

REAL-TIME MDHA
(MULTIPLE-DOPPLER HARMONIC ANALYSIS)

Principal Investigator: John F. Gamache
Collaborating Scientists: Wen-Chau Lee (NCAR/ATD/RSF)
Peter Dodge
Frank Marks, Jr.
Shirley Murillo
Joseph Griffin
Nancy Griffin
Paul Leighton


Objective : To produce a wind field rapidly on the aircraft that incorporates airborne Doppler radar data obtained in normal or FAST (Fore/Aft Scanning Technique) scans.


Rationale: The first priority of HRD's flying is research, including applied research that supports the hurricane forecasting effort, and basic research that helps us to understand physical processes in hurricanes better.  With the advent of the VTD technique, a potential conflict exists between these two needs.  VTD requires Doppler radar scans that are normal to the flight track, but more complete information about storm structure is possible if the hurricane is observed by Doppler from more angles as simultaneously as possible, and this often calls for use of the Fore/Aft Scanning Technique (FAST), where the radar scans alternately in cones fore and aft of the plane perpendicular to the fuselage.  A quick method must be found that uses FAST data.

A second rationale is that more information concerning the radial flow and flow asymmetries can be determined from one pass with one aircraft operating in the FAST mode.  Thus if this method can be made fast enough it will actually be an improvement upon flat scanning VTD.


Method: Presently only the feasibility has been tested, but the method used in the feasibility test is:

Accomplishments :

Last modified: 02/01/00