Engineering topics
Publications and source records attributed to Mcpherson, R. D..
Estimates of requirements likely to be levied on a new observing system for mesoscale meteonology are given. Potential observing systems for mesoscale numerical weather prediction are discussed. Thermodynamic profiler radiometers, infrared radiometer atmospheric sounders, Doppler radar wind profilers and surveillance radar, and moisture profilers are among the instruments described.
Cloud drift winds constitute an important component of the First Global Atmospheric Research Program Experiment data base. Data was generated by far different centers, using somewhat different procedures. Image data transformation to wind vectors is discussed. Emphasis is placed on the differences between the processing techniques employed in each system. The use of cloud drift data by global data assimulation systems is reviewed, including quality control and relative weighting.
Parallel analyses produced with (SAT) and without (NOSAT) the sounding data from the experimental Nimbus-6 and operational NOAA-4 satellites for two data system test periods have indicated that satellite soundings had little impact on forecast through 72 h over the Northern Hemisphere. The effect of remote temperature sounding was generally small and of inconsistent sign, i.e. beneficial in some cases, harmful in others. These positive and negative contributions averaged slightly positive for test period 6 and slightly negative for test period 5. Because of the inconsistency in sign, neither result is much of meteorological consequence. There were, however, systematic differences between the SAT and NOSAT mode analysis: the amplitude of weather systems was consistently less in the SAT mode. The reduced amplitude reflects a tendency for the satellite temperature retrievals to underestimate the spatial variance in the thermal structure of the atmosphere.