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The IHOP2002 (International H20 Project) Field Campaign:
Tracking Invisible Swaths of Moisture for Weather Prediction
Contacts:
Jim Dodge, NASA Headquarters
Email: jdodge@hq.nasa.gov
Phone: 202-358-0763
Belay Demoz, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.
Email: demoz@agnes.gsfc.nasa.gov
Phone: 301-614-6224
Anatta, National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, Colo.
Anatta@ucar.edu
Phone: 303-497-8604
IHOP Campaign Update: [June 3, 2002]
Where's the Water?
Recent pictures from the IHOP experiment during June and July 2002:
Storm Chasing Images Archive
Other Images Archive
Science Goals:
One of the largest weather-related studies in U.S. history will track the nearly invisible swaths of moisture that fuel heavy rain across the southern Great Plains from Texas to Kansas. Scientists hope that analyzing water vapor will be the key to better predictions of when and where summertime storms will form and how intense they will be.
Infrastructure:
Led by scientists from the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), IHOP2002 (International H20 Project) will be based in central Oklahoma from May 13 to June 25. The National Science Foundation, NCAR's primary sponsor, is providing the bulk of the project's $7 million funding, with additional support from other agencies, including the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).
Six aircraft from the United States and Germany will traverse the core study area, some flying as low as 100 feet above the surface. A futuristic, semi-autonomous research craft--the Proteus, sponsored by NASA--will carry instruments up to 45,000 feet. On the ground, an armada of 30 weather-tech vehicles, including four Doppler radars on flatbed trucks, will comb the rural roadways of Oklahoma, Kansas, and Texas. Over 100 scientists and technicians scattered across the plains will be aiming radars and other sensors at water vapor well ahead of the day's first raindrops.
Unlike many weather studies held in this region, IHOP is homing in on the water vapor that feeds showers and thunderstorms, rather than trying to capture episodic events like tornadoes or other severe weather.
Where, when, and how hard it will rain are the most difficult elements to nail down in weather forecasting, especially in spring and summer. Better precipitation outlooks are a key goal of the U.S. Weather Research Program, which has organized a number of agencies in support of IHOP. The study aims to improve forecasts from 1 to 12 hours ahead of heavy rain, which could help in flash-flood safety and other applications.
"Right now the lead time for flash-flood forecasts is well under an hour," says NCAR's David Parsons, co-lead scientist on the study. "If you can extend forecasts of heavy rainfall out a few hours, you're doing great."
Heavy rain depends on an ample supply of moisture, so the lack of water-vapor data is a major forecast impediment. Currently, no device can track tiny molecules of water vapor minute by minute over large areas. Weather balloons (radiosondes) provide most of the water-vapor data used in forecasting; however, their high cost reduces the frequency and spacing of balloon launches. Lidar (laser-based radar) provides more detail than radiosondes, but it can only sample across a few miles, and clouds reduce that range further. Satellite sensors, which cover much of the globe, haven't yet furnished the high-resolution measurements needed in the lower atmosphere for storm prediction.
By mixing older and newer sensors, IHOP2002 will examine how the latest technology can bridge the gaps in water-vapor sensing. Four of the IHOP aircraft will carry state-of-the-art systems that produce vertical profiles of water vapor. These will be used to help calibrate new, higher-precision instruments aboard satellites. Other sensors on the ground will analyze signals from the Global Positioning System (GPS) and other sources. Special high-end radiosondes will be launched for comparison with other data.
Schedule:
The mission will occur from May 13 to June 25, 2002 over much of Oklahoma, northern Texas, and southern Kansas. The operations center in Norman, OK, will be set up and supported by NOAA's National Severe Storms Laboratory (NSSL), UCAR's Joint Office for Science Support (JOSS), and NCAR's Atmospheric Technology Division (ATD). Aircraft will fly out of Oklahoma City's Will Rogers World Airport. The NCAR S-Pol radar and most of the additional ground-based instruments will be deployed in the Oklahoma Panhandle.
Aircraft: (all based at Will Rogers World Airport, Oklahoma City)
| | Period of study | Typical altitudes during IHOP |
| Proteus (for IPO) | May 25-June 14 | Up to 56,000 ft. |
| Flight Int'l Learjet | May 13-June 25 | 14,000-22,000 ft. |
| DLR Falcon (Germany) | May 17-June 14 | 10,000-23,000 ft. |
| NASA DC-8 | May 25-June 13 | 25,000 ft. |
| Naval Research Lab P-3 | May 17-June 25 | 300-14,000 ft |
| U. of Wyoming King Air | May 13-June 25 | 100-4,000 ft. |
Doppler radar
Four mobile Doppler radars from several institutions will travel aboard flatbed trucks. Each one has a compartment for technicians and a rotating transmitter/receiver unit, several feet wide, that can operate while the truck is in motion or parked off road. NCAR's fixed S-Pol radar will be located near Bryan's Corner in the eastern Oklahoma Panhandle. Another NCAR-developed Doppler radar will be on board the P-3 aircraft. Together, these radars will provide details on rainfall location and intensity, as well as the air motion before thunderstorms form.
Other instruments
4 fixed and 4 airborne lidars (laser-based radars that profile moisture and wind across short distances)
1 advanced wind profiler (upward-pointing radar that senses wind direction and speed aloft)
2 sodars (sonic-based radars that sense wind direction and speed aloft)
3 interferometers (devices that detect radiation and infer water vapor and temperature)
1 mobile and 3 profiling radiometers (devices that sense radiation emitted by water vapor)
400 dropsondes (instrument packages that parachute to earth from airplanes)
1 tethersonde system (weather station on a line tethered to a balloon floating as high as
3,000 feet)
52 GPS receivers (sensors that infer moisture from changes in a GPS signal)
15 fixed and 9 mobile weather stations, all specially tailored for IHOP
800 radiosondes (instrumented weather balloons), plus special launches
Data will also be provided by the U.S. Department of Energy Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) network, the Oklahoma Mesonet, and standard observing networks.
Project Web site:
http://www.atd.ucar.edu/dir_off/projects/2002/IHOP.html
http://www.ucar.edu/communications/newsreleases/2002/IHOPimagery.html
Organizations Involved in the Mission:
Participating institutions from the U.S., Canada, France, and Germany:
National Science Foundation • National Aeronautics and Space Administration • National Center for Atmospheric Research • National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration • Department of Energy • University Corporation for Atmospheric Research • National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS) • Integrated Program Office (DOD, DOC/NOAA, and NASA) • French National Center for Scientific Research • Météo-France
Universities:
University of Alabama in Huntsville • University of California, Los Angeles • University of Colorado • University of Connecticut • University of Maryland at Baltimore County • Massachusetts Institute of Technology • University of Massachusetts • University of Minnesota • University of Nevada and its Desert Research Institute • University of Oklahoma and its Cooperative Institute for Mesoscale Meteorological Studies • Pennsylvania State University • University of Wisconsin-Madison • University of Wyoming • McGill University (Canada) • University of Hohenheim (Germany).
Other participants:
Colorado Research Associates • German Aerospace Center
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