Central Region Technical Attachment 92-11 Using New Technology To
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/Ou)%-c<v^A cU-i CRH SSD MAY 1992 CENTRAL REGION TECHNICAL ATTACHMENT 92-11 USING NEW TECHNOLOGY TO LOCATE AND FORECAST THE MOVEMENT OF A FRONT IN THE MESOSCALE MICHAEL K. HOLZINGER NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE FORECAST OFFICE DENVER, COLORADO 1. INTRODUCTION The National Weather Service (NWS) is testing much of the future technology in an operational environment at the Weather Service Forecast Office (WSFO) in Denver, Colorado. The Denver AWIPS Risk Reduction and Requirements Evaluation (DARRRE II) workstat ion at the WSFO gives forecasters the ability to analyze mesosc- ale features in much more detail and make local forecasts with more precision than was possible a few years ago. WSFO Denver conducted an experimental project, called the En hanced Terminal Forecast (EFT) program, between January and November, 1991 (NWS 1990; NWS 1991). In place of standard avia tion terminal forecasts, EFT forecasts were issued for the three terminals in the Denver metropolitan area. These are Stapleton International Airport (DEN), Centennial Airport (APA), and Jefferson County Airport (BJC) (Fig. 1A). Compared to conven tional terminal forecasts, the EFT had a slightly different format, slightly different amendment criteria, disallowed the use of terms "chance" and "slight chance" during the first three hours, and attempted to nail down weather changes to the nearest 15 minutes during the first three hours. Perhaps, the best opportunity to attempt forecasts to the nearest 15 minutes along the Front Range is provided by warm season wind shifts, either gust fronts or frontal. Warm season wind shifts can often be spotted on Doppler radar an hour or more before they reach DEN. The forecaster can then track and time the wind shift, while providing accurate warning to the airport well in advance of the event. Clear air wind shifts can be tracked in the summer, due to the high sensitivity of the Doppler radar and because of the presence of airborne scatterers (usually flying insects). This paper provides an example of how the EFT forecaster used the new technology to provide updated EFT's for DEN during a time period characterized by significant wind shifts. 'V 7932 -cax, timmx . ' ■ CR TA 92-11 MAY 1992 2 . DATA SOURCES Mile High Radar (MHR) is the Doppler radar being used by WSFO Denver. It is similar to the WSR-88D radars currently being deployed by the NWS. Other technologies used in this case (available to Denver forecasters via the DARRRE II workstation) were the experimental mesonet and surface analyses from the Local Analysis and Prediction System (LAPS) model (McGinley 1989; McGinley et al. 1991). The mesonet consists of 22 automated surface observation stations that report data every five minutes. LAPS utilizes all available surface observations, satellite data, profiler data, and radar data to produce surface analyses of several variables every hour. These analyses have recently been made available on the workstation on an experimental basis. The LAPS domain consists of all of central and eastern Colorado plus a small part of Wyoming, Nebraska, and Kansas. MHR is located about 10 miles (16 km) northeast of DEN. Figures 1 through 6 are pictures of workstation displays from MHR (eleva tion angle 1.2 degrees) and other data for a radius of approxi mately 75 miles (121 km) around MHR. One of the mesonet stations (AUR) is located at DEN. Mountains just west of Denver show up as ground clutter. Each figure is accompanied by a schematic (Figs. 1A-6A) which depicts the front as a dashed line. 3. ANALYSIS AND FORECAST On 26 June 1991, a front moved through DEN three times, twice as a cold front, and once as a warm front. There were no signifi cant clouds associated with the front all day. Winds were the only concern to the EFT forecaster. The first frontal passage (cold front) occurred at 1000 UTC (0400 MDT), and had only a weak wind shift associated with it. MHR was not operating until near midday (1800 UTC). At midday, the mesonet and MHR showed that the front had become stationary about 15 to 20 (24 to 32 km) miles southeast of DEN. Figure 1 (MHR reflectivity and mesonet) at 2130 UTC shows the front had not moved much from its midday location. The front could be clearly identified, both on reflectivity (fine line) and on velocity (sharp line defining winds toward and winds away from the radar). The front extended northeast to southwest, east and south of Denver. The new EFT issued at 2137 UTC 26 June 1991 (forecast A in Fig. 7) reflected the forecaster's belief that the front would move north again as a warm front. An estimate of the arrival time of the warm front at DEN was 0300 UTC 27 June 1991. 2 CR TA 92-11 MAY 1992 The main thing that concerned the forecaster at this point was the possibility of low level wind shear (LLWS), especially if the front advanced northward as expected (Badner 1979) . The mesonet showed strong south to southwest winds at 15-20 knots (8 to 10 m/s) with gusts up to 33 knots (17 m/s) south of the front, while winds north of the front were from the north at 12-15 knots (6 to 8 m/s) gusting to 17-20 knots (9 to 10 m/s). Horizontal sus tained wind shear across the front was about 25-30 knots (13 to 15 m/s)—stronger using wind gusts. Doppler velocities were similar. The forecaster then used an application of the workstation called "Read Cursor" to determine the depth of the frontal boundary. The "Read Cursor" application, among other things, enables the forecaster to find the height above ground of the center of the radar beam at any spot on the MHR display. In this case the forecaster found a spot on the velocity display north of MHR where the radar beam penetrated the frontal boundary aloft, shown by a sudden shift in wind direction. By interpolating between that point and the front at the surface, the forecaster concluded that the frontal boundary over DEN was about 1000 feet AGL. This meant that there was a potential for strong LLWS below 2000 feet, and the forecaster added the remark "LLWS" to the terminal forecast. There were no reports of significant LLWS at DEN from pilots. However, at 2220 UTC there was a pilot report 14 miles south southeast of DEN of +/- 10 knots (5 m/s) of wind shear at 500 feet AGL (Fig. 7). Several LAPS parameters were compared to mesonet, surface obser vations, and MHR data. For instance, LAPS winds did a consis tently good job of identifying the location of the front, while other parameters, such as LAPS dew points had varying degrees of success. Figure 2 at 2200 UTC shows that there were some prob lems at this particular time with attempting to use LAPS dew poi nts (overlaid on MHR velocity and the mesonet). For example, mesonet stations at BYE and LTN did not agree with the LAPS analysis. However, LAPS winds at 2200 UTC did a very good job of locating the front, especially in the Denver area. This wind analysis is shown in Fig. 3 along with the Doppler velocity and mesonet data. At 2235 UTC, the front could be seen on MHR as a sharp boundary advancing northward toward DEN. At this time, the forecaster used the "Distance/Speed of Motion" application (a simple linear extrapolation routine) on the workstation to time the front, and updated the forecast at 2237 UTC (forecast B - Fig. 7) to indi cate a warm frontal passage (WFP) at 0000 UTC 27 June 1991. 3 CR TA 92-11 MAY 1992 The observations (Fig. 7) show the front going through DEN at 2348 UTC, as indicated by a strong wind shift. The terminal forecast issued over an hour earlier was within 15 minutes of being correct. The forecaster used MHR, the mesonet, and obser vations from Centennial Airport to forecast the expected winds behind the front. He then kept the Stapleton tower informed periodically by phone of the progress of the front. A written terminal forecast amendment isn't always sufficient! With the warm air finally over DEN, the high temperature came late — 91°F at 0100 UTC (1900 MDT). This was a day that challenged the public forecaster as well as the aviation forecaster. Another attempt to correlate LAPS dew points with the frontal boundary was done at 0000 UTC. Figure 4 depicts the Doppler velocity, LAPS dew points, and mesonet data. It can be seen here that the dew point analysis at this time correlated better with observations. Figure 5 shows Doppler velocity and mesonet data at 0035 UTC, at which time the front had stalled again just north of DEN. The eastern end of the front was no longer easily located by MHR or other data. A regular EFT forecast update was issued at 0037 UTC (Forecast C — Fig. 7) in which the forecaster anticipated that the front would weaken by 0300 UTC and no longer affect DEN. However, at 0120 UTC the front was moving south again as a cold front. The forecaster again used the "Distance/Speed of Motion" application to time the front southward through DEN (this time as a cold front). An amended forecast (forecast D — Fig. 7), placed the cold frontal passage (CFP) through DEN at 0145 UTC. As with the previous frontal passage, the forecaster called the tower to warn them of the expected wind shift. The phone call was even more important due to the short warning time. As shown by the observations (Fig.