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IMU Past Projects

FY 2009 Significant Accomplishments

• Experimental Products and Services and Impact Weather Support:

  • a local experimental demonstration was completed during the summer of 2009 to issue in-house lightning advisories and warnings for the areas within 5 nm of Melbourne and Orlando International Airports. The KMLB 88D and Orlando TDWR radars as well as LDAR data from the KSC network were utilized to give advance alerting capability to the risk of a cloud to ground lightning strike. The results of this project were presented at the Southern Thunder Workshop, the 2009 NWA Annual and 2010 AMS Annual Meetings.
  • Installation of HYSPLIT code to support on-demand local runs and fixed site runs for plume dispersion modeling.
  • developed a local MODIS SST composite graphic for gulf stream identification.

• Near shore Wave Modeling Initiative:

  • work continued on the Collaborative Science, Technology, and Applied Research Program (CSTAR) project to produce a high resolution wave model (CMS Wave/WABED)for the near shore waters for NWS Melbourne and Miami. Operational runs of WABED near-shore wave model run at FIT configured for ingest in AWIPS and GFE. High resolution near shore wave model implemented in operations for five sub-domains along the East Central Florida coast to improve near shore wave forecasts.

  • with collaboration from WFO MIA an initial configuration of the SWAN near shore model was completed. GFE configuration was also completed to allow forecasters to request on-demand SWAN wave model runs.

• Tropical Cyclone program projects:

  • development and testing of new HLS formatter as part of the national HLS Formatter Team, including conducting developing and conducting training scenarios with the new formatter.

  • Testing, development and configuration of GFE Tropical Cycone Hazard Graphics and Smart Tools for national experimental Tropical Cyclone Impact Graphics project. Expansion of Tropical Cylcone Impact Graphics to all coastal offices.

• Collaborative Techniques to Enhance Information Exchange:

  • collaborated with Applied Meteorology Unit entities in support of official tasks: including making recommendations for new statistical method to calculate Lightning Probabilities around NWS MLB TAF sites.
  • Warm Season Lightning Probabilities for NWS MLB TAF sites installed on local intranet and forecaster training given to improve aviation forecasts.

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• Authored / co-authored several conference pre-prints related to mesoscale and dispersion modeling, operational lightning and tropical cyclone issues, provided comments on AMU tasks, and attended and/or participated in several conferences and interagency meetings. See NWS Melbourne Local Reserch page for additional information.

FY 2008 Significant Accomplishments

• Experimental One-hour Thunderstorm Graphics and Impact Weather Support:

  • a demonstration was completed during the summer of 2008 to produce the Orlando International Airport TRACON Collaborative Convective Forecast Product which included two six-hour forecasts a day of one-hour thunderstorm coverage graphics within 75 nm of Orlando International Airport for aviation customers, airport managers and FAA personel. NWS MLB meteorologists collaborated with CWSUs Jacksonville and Miami twice a day to produce the forecasters that were made available on an experimental web site.
  • the high temporal resolution one-hour thunderstorm graphics were also generated for NWS Melbourne forecast area and were utilized in the Impact Weather Update and Graphicast.
  • configured a GFE Incident Spot Forecast Formatter for incident support forecasts to support emergency management agencies, first responders and incident exercises.

  • developed a local AWIPS application, VIL of the Day, which output potential severe hail VIL thresholds based on Florida raob data. Implemented for operational use for the summer 2008 convective season to support the NWS MLB Severe Weather program.

• Near shore Wave Modeling Initiative:

  • work continued on the Collaborative Science, Technology, and Applied Research Program (CSTAR) project to produce a high resolution wave model (CMS Wave/WABED)for the near shore waters for NWS Melbourne and Miami. Test domains in the Melbourne and Miami coastal waters were configured.

  • COMET Partners Project "Towards development of a 'rapid response' local wave model for the Melbourne, Florida National Weather Service Forecast Office" was completed in the summer of 2008.

• Tropical Cyclone program projects:

  • contined development of Tropical ZFP and CWF GFE formatters to include Expressions of Uncertainty.
  • traveled to NWSH/Raytheon for GFE HLS formatter testing for AWIPS Build OB 8.2.1. Found critical DRs that need to fixed during testing. Testing in preparation for first year with VTEC in the HLS product.

  • Testing, development and configuration of GFE Tropical Cycone Hazard Graphics and Smart Tools for national experimental Tropical Cyclone Impact Graphics project.

• Collaborative Techniques to Enhance Information Exchange:

  • collaborated with Applied Meteorology Unit entities in support of official tasks. Composite Soundings for warm season convective regimes installed on AWIPS to assist forecasters in refining gHWO Lightning Threat graphics.

  • provided Incident Support Meteorological (ISMET) services to NWS MLB Incident Response Meteorologists (J. Pendergrast and T. Sedlock) for a Disney traning exercise and the Canaveral Groves Wildfire incident.

• Authored / co-authored several conference pre-prints related to mesoscale and dispersion modeling, operational lightning and tropical cyclone issues, provided comments on AMU tasks, and attended and/or participated in several conferences and interagency meetings. See NWS Melbourne Local Reserch page for additional information.

FY 2007 Significant Accomplishments

• Impact Weather and Incident Support Program:

  • new experimental product, Impact Weather Update and Graphicast, implemented during the summer convective season. This product typically addresses the short range hazardous weather situation through a series of posts in chronological order. It is meant to supplement official products while allowing the forecaster to convey additional in a more frequent and less formal format. Graphicasts are also often included to exand on and supplement information in the text forecast updates.
  • developed an operational concept for the NWS Melbourne Incident Support Program - to provide detailed and enhanced meteorological support to (or through) government agencies for the protection of life and property through planned events and unplanned incidents.
  • situational awareness display monitors set up in the operations area and forecasters trained on configuring the four displays for hazardous weather monitoring in varying weather situations.
  • support to Volusia county emergency management during Speed Week. Incident support meteorologist deployed with internet/voice chat communication to the office trough the incident support laptop which was configured with meteorological applications for NWS field support.

  • coordinated with local Homeland Security Program leader to determine two locations in NWS Melbourne forecast area for routine HYSPLIT runs with request forwarded to NCEP.

• Near shore Wave Modeling Initiative:

  • a Collaborative Science, Technology, and Applied Research Program (CSTAR) proposal was submitted with NWS/SR endorsement and approved. The project outlines work for configuring a local WRF/WABED coupled (ocean/atmosphere) modeling system with enhanced data assimilation at WFOs Miami and Melbourne. The project will support the work of three Principle Investigators (PIs) at FIT, Dr. Lazarus, Dr. Chiao, and Dr. Zarillo. The goals of this project are to improve the near shore wave forecasts through the use of a higher resolution wave (CMS Wave/WABED) model.

  • COMET Partners Proposal "Towards development of a 'rapid response' local wave model for the Melbourne, Florida National Weather Service Forecast Office" submitted.

• Tropical Cyclone program projects:

  • "Tropical Cyclone Hazard Graphics: Wind Risk and Wind Threat" presented at NOAA Hurricane Conference. "Experimental Local Tropical Cyclone Local Hazard Graphics Update" presented at Governor's Hurricane Conference.
  • national Training developed for Tropical Cyclone Expressions of Uncertainty for ZFP and CWF.

  • continued to refine and develop GFE SmartTools for Tropical Cyclone Hazard Graphics.

• Collaborative Techniques to Enhance Information Exchange:

  • collaborated with Applied Meteorology Unit entities in support of official tasks including NWA presentation "Using Flow Regime Lightning and Sounding Climatologies to Initialize Lightning Threat Forecasts for East Central Florida" and developed Composite Soundings on AWIPS task for 2007 tasking cycle.

  • continued to serve as Principal Investigator on U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Climate Forecasting System (CFS) subproject "Tropical Cyclone Forecasting and Warning" between the Government of India and the National Weather Service. Hosted Indian scientist on tour to the U.S., with an emphasize on forecast communications.

• Authored / co-authored several conference pre-prints related to mesoscale modeling, operational lightning and tropical cyclone issues, provided comments on AMU tasks, and attended and/or participated in several conferences and interagency meetings. See NWS Melbourne Local Reserch page for additional information.

FY 2006 Significant Accomplishments

• Graphical (gridded) forecast product suite :
  • completed local stratification of lightning database and incorporated resultant gridded data files into the Advanced Weather Information Processing System (AWIPS) Graphical Forecast Editor (GFE).
  • implemented lightning hazard graphic 'first guess' based on synoptic regime, for 'graphical Hazardous Weather Outlook' (gHWO).
  • continued to serve on national 'tropical cyclone hazard graphics team' to assist transition of graphical Hurricane Local Statement (gHLS) to official/national product.
  • continued to test experimental tropical cyclone wind probability grids; used grids to automate first guess field for gHLS wind threat and post suite of local experimental wind probabilities.

• Weather Research and Forecast (WRF) model:

  • Implemented two local WRF production cycles (8km resolution and 2.5 km resolution).
  • replaced ARPS output with WRF output on AWIPS and set-up image production for internet graphics suite.

  • expanded operational use of local WRF model configurations.

• Collaborative Techniques to Enhance Information Exchange:

  • developed, tested, and implemented realtime 'impact weather discussions and graphics' (blogs) for use during selected situations.
  • collaborated with Applied Meteorology Unit entities in support of official tasks: "Situational Lightning Climatologies for Central Florida - Phase 2" and "WRF Sensitivity Studies."

  • continued to serve as Principal Investigator on U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Climate Forecasting System (CFS) subproject "Tropical Cyclone Forecasting and Warning" between the Government of India and the National Weather Service. Provided local training to Indian scientists on study tours to the U.S., with an emphasize on forecast communications.

• Cooperative Program for Operational Meteorology, Education and Training (COMET) Partners Project:

  • completed project to use GOES SSTs to retrieve over-ocean air temperatures in support of local data assimilation and modeling efforts [FIT/MIA/MLB].

• Authored / co-authored several conference pre-prints related to mesoscale modeling, operational lightning and tropical cyclone issues, provided comments on AMU tasks, and attended and/or participated in several conferences and interagency meetings:

  • authored/co-authored and/or presented oral(s)/poster(s):

    • Multi-Platform Real-Time Sea Surface Temperature Analysis for the Initialization of Short-Term Operational Forecasts¹
    • Using Cloud-to-Ground Lightning Climatologies to Initialize Gridded Lightning Threat Forecasts for East Central Florida²
    • Employing hurricane wind probabilities to enhance local forecasts and improve guidance for decision-makers³
    • The WSR-88D Tropical Cyclone Operations Plan: a living document⁴
    • Major land-falling hurricanes as mesoscale convective systems: a paradigm shift for WFO operations⁵
    • Providing short-fused warnings for the onset of extreme hurricane winds - a final opportunity to minimize casualties³
    ¹10th Symposium on Integrated Observing and Assimilation Systems for the Atmosphere, Oceans, and Land Surface (IOAS-AOLS), Atlanta, GA; ^{2Second Conference on Meteorological Applications of Lightning Data, Atlanta, GA; 327th Conference on Hurricanes and Tropical Meteorology, Monterey, CA; 460th Interdepartmental Hurricane Conference, Mobile, AL; 5 23rd Conference on Severe Local Storms. St. Louis, MO}
    

• Provided maintenance and modifications to the ARPS/ADAS analysis and prognostic schemes
  • transferred ADAS production to a new LINUX workstation
  • upgraded ARPS to version 5.1.2
  • procured additional nodes for cluster to allow eight 9-hour model runs per day (versus current four runs)
  • tested operational implementation of prototype ADAS GUI to allow forecasters to interact more efficiently with data ingest

‘Turning Science into Service'