Meteorology Commons^™

The Weather And Air Traffic Management Integration Course In The Graduate Aeronautics Program At Embry-Riddle, John Lanicci

John M Lanicci

One year ago, Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University added a new Area of Concentration (AOC) in Aviation Meteorology to the Master of Science in Aeronautics (MSA) program at the Daytona Beach, Florida campus. As part of the preparation for the start of this program, an experimental graduate seminar in Weather and Air Traffic Integration was taught over the summer, which attracted graduate students with backgrounds in commercial and private aviation, applied meteorology, and engineering physics. The purpose of this course was to introduce the students to the concept of weather and air traffic integration as it currently exists and is being planned …

Weather Technology In The Cockpit (Wtic): Concept Of Operations, User Needs, Education, And Training, John Lanicci, L. Kirk, L. Martin, J. Vacek, E. A. Roberts, M. Edwards

John M Lanicci

The FAA, through sponsorship of the Center for General Aviation Research (CGAR), has funded a multi-disciplinary research program on Weather Technology In the Cockpit (WTIC). The CGAR is a consortium of four universities, three of which (Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, University of North Dakota, University of Alaska-Anchorage) are working together on this program. Each university partner has the lead on a portion of the project: the University of Alaska-Anchorage is the lead on developing the WTIC Concept of Operations (CONOPS); the University of North Dakota is the lead on developing a robust set of WTIC user needs; Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University is …

General Aviation Weather Encounter Case Studies, John Lanicci, Massoud Bazargan, Daniel Halperin, Scott Shappell, Jaclyn Baron, Rebecca Iden, Carla Hackworth, Kali Holcomb

John M Lanicci

This study presents a compilation of 24 cases involving general aviation (GA) pilots’ weather encounters over the continental U.S. The project team interviewed pilots who had experienced a weather encounter, and we examined their backgrounds, flight experience, and weather encounter details. Results from meteorological data analysis for each weather encounter were consistent with findings of larger GA weather accident studies in terms of the types of hazards encountered and flight phase during which the encounters occurred. Investigation of pilot weather products and the sources from which they were obtained revealed a lack of uniformity of pre-flight data sources and underutilization …

Analysis Of Climatological Rainfall Extremes Over The Kennedy Space Center Complex Using A High-Density Observational Network, John Lanicci, Adam Schnapp

John M Lanicci

The use of observational datasets to determine the occurrence frequencies of extreme weather events has gained a lot of recent interest due to concerns about the potential regional impacts from global climate change. Extreme-value theory can quantify the return frequency of the most extreme events using climatologically short data sets and the assumption that such short climatological periods are stationary. However, the resulting analyses must be used with caution since they may not accurately reflect the potential of extreme events in the future due to climate change and variability. Accurately predicting extreme-event likelihood is important for building realistic long-range planning …

Assessing The Effectiveness Of An Education And Training Module For General Aviation Pilots On The Use Of Nexrad-Based Products In The Cockpit, John Lanicci, Erin Roberts, E. Blickensderfer

John M Lanicci

Numerous studies over the years have documented the need to improve meteorological education and training for General Aviation (GA) pilots. With the advent of readily available aviation weather hazard products for real-time pilot use on the flight deck, there is now a lack of education and training on the proper interpretation and usage of these products. Data-linked NEXRAD is a good example of a currently available real-time product that is very popular in the GA community, but lacks a coherent understanding of its proper usage in pre-flight planning and in-flight operation.

Proper usage of NEXRAD in the cockpit should require …

Guaranteed Access To Space, Kennedy Space Center/Cape Canaveral, And Climate Change, John Lanicci, J.E. Thropp

John M Lanicci

Guaranteed access to space is a major tenet of U.S. national security policy. Over the last 10 years, over two-thirds of U.S. space launches have originated from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station (CCAFS) and Kennedy Space Center (KSC), Florida. During the transition of the U.S. manned space program from a public-sector operation to a mixture of public and private sector responsibilities, continued access to space from the CCAFS/KSC complex is necessary to maintain U.S. leadership in space and the continuation of Space Situational Awareness, defined as understanding and maintaining awareness of the population of objects orbiting the earth. The CCAFS/KSC …

Weather And Collaborative Decision Making In The Aviation Community: Two “Tactical” Case Study Examples, John Lanicci, R. E. Haley, K. Rader

John M Lanicci

Collaborative Decision Making (CDM) in the aviation community has been defined as a “cooperative effort between the various components of aviation transportation, both government and industry, to exchange information for better decision making” (http://cdm.fly.faa.gov/). Two central tenets of CDM are that better information will lead to better decision-making, and that tools and procedures will enable air navigation service providers and flight operators to respond to changing conditions more readily. CDM can trace its roots to the mid 1990s, when airlines began sharing information about flight schedules with air traffic managers in an effort to determine potential “bottlenecks” in the National …

Challenges Associated With Space Weather Analysis And Prediction, John Lanicci

John M Lanicci

The term “space weather” is typically used to describe environmental conditions in the region extending from the sun’s surface, through the interplanetary medium, to the earth’s magnetic field and upper atmosphere, with a focus on those conditions that can affect the earth, its technological systems, and population. Space weather conditions are monitored continuously by a number of agencies around the world. These agencies use both satellite- and ground-based measurements to build analyses and employ predictive models that form the basis for impacts-based products dealing with myriad users in satellite operations, the utility industry, aviation, and satellite-based communications, to name a …

A Statistical Model To Forecast Short-Term Atlantic Hurricane Intensity, Kevin Law, Jay Hobgood

Kevin Law

An alternative 24-h statistical hurricane intensity model is presented and verified for 13 hurricanes during the 2004–05 seasons. The model uses a new method involving a discriminant function analysis (DFA) to select from a collection of multiple regression equations. These equations were developed to predict the future 24-h wind speed increase and the 24-h pressure drop that were constructed from a dataset of 103 hurricanes from 1988 to 2003 that utilized 25 predictors of rapid intensification. The accuracy of the 24-h wind speed increase models was tested and compared with the official National Hurricane Center (NHC) 24-h intensity forecasts, which …

The Impact Of Oceanic Heat Content On The Rapid Intensification Of Atlantic Hurricanes, Kevin Law

Kevin Law

With the increased infrastructure and amount of people living along the United States coastline, it is imperative to improve the accuracy of Atlantic hurricane intensity forecasts. Over the last 10 years, there have been many Atlantic hurricanes, including Hurricanes Katrina and Charley that surprised many forecasters with their rapid intensification and power. The rapid intensification of tropical cyclones is the most serious aspect, when it comes to forecasting. It is generally accepted that sufficient surface ocean temperatures (approximately 26°C) are needed to produce and sustain tropical cyclone formation. However, the sea-surface temperature (SST) has shown not to be critical in …

Spatio-Temporal Variability Of Daily And Weekly Precipitation Extremes In South America, Shiraj Khan, Gabriel Kuhn, Auroop Ganguly, David Erickson Iii, George Ostrouchov

Auroop R. Ganguly

Spatial and temporal variability of precipitation extremes are investigated by utilizing daily observations available at 2.5° gridded fields in South America for the period 1940–2004. All 65 a of data from 1940–2004 are analyzed for spatial variability. The temporal variability is investigated at each spatial grid by utilizing 25-a moving windows from 1965–2004 and visualized through plots of the slope of the regression line in addition to its quality measure (R²). The Poisson-generalized Pareto (Poisson-GP) model, which is a peaks over threshold (POT) approach, is applied to weekly precipitation maxima residuals based on the 95%-quantile threshold, while daily data are …

Book Review: The Great Warming: Climate Change And The Rise And Fall Of Civilizations, James Fleming

James R. Fleming

No abstract provided.

Dialogue Television: The Climate Engineers, James Fleming

James R. Fleming

The problem of global warming is getting massive public attention. This comes forty years after the first major government report outlining the problem. But there is considerable disagreement over what steps should be taken to mitigate the problem and some scientist fear that politicians are not displaying sufficient urgency. James Fleming describes the technological quick fixes proposed by some scientists and the problems they might create.

The Climate Engineers: Playing God To Save The Planet, James Fleming

James R. Fleming

As alarm over global warming spreads, a radical idea is gaining momentum. Forget cuts in greenhouse-gas emissions, some scientists argue. Find a technological fix. Bounce sunlight back into space by pumping reflective nanoparticles into the atmosphere. Launch mirrors into orbit around the earth. Create a “planetary thermostat.” But what sounds like science fiction is actually an old story. For more than a century, scientists, soldiers, and charlatans have hatched schemes to manipulate the weather and climate. Like them, today’s aspiring climate engineers wildly exaggerate what is possible, and they scarcely consider political, military, and ethical implications of attempting to manage …