| During the 2007 tornado
season, the NSF Engineering Research Center (ERC) for Collaborative Adaptive
Sensing of the Atmosphere (CASA) transmitted real-time data from its first
prototype network in Oklahoma to National Weather Service (NWS) forecasters
for evaluation in the Experimental Warning Program. CASA, headquartered
at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, is revolutionizing weather
sensing by developing dense, low-cost radar networks that can sense the
lower atmosphere, a critical area that is under-sampled by today’s technologies.
These networks will improve the nation’s ability to predict, forecast,
and respond to tornados, floods, and severe thunderstorms. The Center is
achieving its goals through research and deployment of prototype systems
in Oklahoma’s tornado alley, Houston’s flood zones, and Puerto Rico’s mountainous
terrain.
The Experimental Warning
Program, sponsored by the NWS’ National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration,
brings together forecasters, researchers, trainers, developers, and user
groups from around the nation to test and evaluate new data, techniques,
applications, observing platforms, and technologies. The finely grained
observations of the lower atmosphere obtained by the CASA researchers allowed
forecasters to see small meteorological structures that are close to the
ground—such as mini wind circulations—and that are embedded in larger storms.
The National Weather Service classified one of these observed circulations
as an EF1 tornado (one having wind gusts of 86–110 miles per hour). These
small structures are very difficult to discern with the current observing
technology. The Center’s data will continue to be evaluated in the Experimental
Warning Program during the 2008 tornado season. |
