Meteorological Applications

Dr. J. Colins Johnny

 Meteorological Applications
• Oceanographic Applications
• Weather Forecasting
• Aviation Meteorology
• Agriculture and Irrigation Management
• Meteorology in Transportation Industry
• Business and Trade Application
 aviation industry
• aviation industry is especially sensitive to the weather, accurate
weather forecasting is essential.
• Fog or exceptionally low ceilings can prevent many aircraft from
landing and taking off.
• Turbulence and icing are also significant in-flight hazards.
• Thunderstorms are a problem for all aircraft because of severe
turbulence due to their updrafts and outflow boundaries, icing due
to the heavy precipitation, as well as large hail, strong winds, and
lightning, all of which can cause severe damage to an aircraft in
flight.
• Volcanic ash is also a significant problem for aviation, as aircraft
can lose engine power within ash clouds.
• On a day-to-day basis airliners are routed to take
advantage of the jet stream tailwind to improve fuel
efficiency.
• Aircrews are briefed prior to takeoff on the conditions
to expect en route and at their destination.
• Additionally, airports often change which runway is
being used to take advantage of a headwind.
• This reduces the distance required for takeoff, and
eliminates potential crosswinds.
 AGRICULTURE AND IRRIGATION
MANAGEMENT
• Farmers rely on weather forecasts to decide what work to do on any
particular day.
• For example, drying hay is only feasible in dry weather. Prolonged
periods of dryness can ruin cotton, wheat, and corn crops.
• While corn crops can be ruined by drought, their dried remains can
be used as a cattle feed substitute in the form of silage.
• Frosts and freezes play havoc with crops both during the spring and
fall.
• For example, peach trees in full bloom can have their potential
peach crop decimated by a spring freeze.
• Orange groves can suffer significant damage during frosts and
freezes, regardless of their timing.
 Cyclone
• In the past fifty years NOAA, with help from NASA, has established a
remote sensing capability on polar and geostationary platforms that
has proven useful in monitoring and predicting severe weather such
as tornadic outbreaks, tropical cyclones, and flash floods in the short
term, and climate trends indicated by sea surface temperatures,
biomass burning, and cloud cover in the longer term.
• This has become possible first with the visible and infrared window
imagery of the 1970s and has been augmented with the
temperature and moisture sounding capability of the 1980s.
• Applications include temperature and moisture analyses for weather
prediction, analysis of atmospheric stability, estimation of tropical
cyclone intensity and position, and global analyses of clouds.
 Understanding Cyclone
• The TIROS Operational Vertical Sounder (TOVS) included both infrared and
microwave observations with the latter helping considerably to alleviate the
influence of clouds for all weather soundings.
• The Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES) VISSR
Atmospheric Sounder (VAS) was used to develop procedures for retrieving
atmospheric temperature, moisture, and wind at hourly intervals in the
northern hemisphere.
• Temporal and spatial changes in atmospheric moisture and stability improved
severe storm warnings.
• Atmospheric flow fields (deep layer mean wind field composites from cloud
drift, water vapour drift, and thermal gradient winds) helped to improve
hurricane trajectory forecasting.
• In 1994, the first of NOAA's next generation of geostationary satellites, GOES-
8, dramatically improved the imaging and sounding capability.
 Forecasting cyclone
• Applications of these NOAA data also extended to the climate
programs; archives from the last fifteen years offer important
information about the effects of aerosols and greenhouse gases
and possible trends in global temperature.
• Looking to the future, forecasters are working to use satellite and
radar observing systems to investigate the evolution and structure
of cloud systems and perform short term forecasts and warnings.
• With the advent of improved mesoscale numerical models, the
importance of interpretation of radar and satellite images and
soundings is not diminished, but rather magnified as the
forecaster now has the added task of using the observations
critically to examine the predicted sequence of events.
• There is a need for higher temporal, spatial, and spectral
resolution in the future radiometers.
• Higher temporal resolution is becoming possible with
detector array technology; higher spatial resolution may
come with active cooling of infrared detectors so that smaller
signals can be measured with adequate signal to noise.
• Higher spectral resolution is being considered through the
use of interferometers and grating spectrometers.
• Advanced microwave radiometers measuring moisture as well
as temperature profiles are flying in polar orbit; a
geostationary complement is being investigated.