Ship board radar information There are a wide variety of radars that can and have been deloyed on board the ships NOAA/K 35GHz Scanning Cloud Radar http://www.etl.noaa.gov/technology/instruments/noaak/noaak.3pager.pdf PSD has developed a Ka-band (8.7-mm wavelength) system designed primarily for observations of non-precipitating and weakly precipitating clouds. By virtue of its short wavelength, it has excellent sensitivity to very small hydrometeors and is insensitive to ground clutter. The radar has been used extensively for research of the radiative effects of clouds for climate change programs and for observations of winter storms. A rotating quarter-wave plate allows transmission of a continuous sequence of polarizations from circular to elliptical to linear to examine hydrometeor types. The radar transmits 85-kW of peak power in a 0.5-degree conical beam width using a 1-m parabolic antenna with an offset Cassegrain feed. Radial velocity, reflectivity, and depolarization are measured at 256 gates with 37.5m resolution using PPI and RHI or fixed beam scans. Sensitivity is about -30 dBZ at 10-km range. In another configuration H,V, or slant-linear dual-polarization is available with a 1.8 meter antenna for even greater sensitivity. The radar uses ETL's new Radar Acquisition and Display (RADS) system. PSD Millimeter-Wave Cloud Radar (MMCR) http://www.etl.noaa.gov/technology/instruments/mmcr/mmcr.bams.1998.pdf PSD designed and built the MMCR in the 1990's for the U.S. Department of Energy's Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) program to monitor cloud conditions over Cloud and Radiation Testbed (CART) sites. Using data from many instruments at these sites, scientists are examining how clouds affect climate and climate change through their interactions with radiant energy in the atmosphere. The MMCR is an unattended 35-GHz Doppler radar that has the ability to detect extremely weak clouds as well as precipitation overhead. It uses a 6-ft or 10-ft antenna and sophisticated signal processing methods to attain exceptionally good sensitivity and a low-power transmitter for dependable long-term operations. Height resolution of the data is as good as 45 m. The first MMCR was installed at the site in Oklahoma in 1996, followed by others in Alaska and the tropical western Pacific. An upgraded data system and dual-polarization hardware are now being constructed at ETL for the ARM MMCRs. Ron Brown Scanning Precipitation Radar (C-Band) NOAA/ETL serves as instrument mentor for the Doppler C-band radar which was built and installed by Radtec Engineering, Inc.. The instrument is available to principle investigators for a wide variety of marine studies sponsored by NOAA and other agencies. C-band represents a compromise between more heavily attenuated higher radar frequencies, such as X-band, and the larger size and weight requirements of lower frequency S-band weather radars, such those used for the land-based WSR-88D (NEXRAD) systems. In many respects, this radar is the equivalent of an oceangoing NEXRAD that can provide research-quality observations, in addition to routine storm surveillance. Rain statistics at sea derived from its data are well suited for evaluating assumptions used in satellite precipitation algorithms. S-band Precipitation Profiler http://www.etl.noaa.gov/~bmartner/articles/sband.journal.pdf The S-band vertical profiler is based on existing S-band and UHF profiler technology which has been modified for research. It's dynamic range has been extended to study moderate to heavy precipitation which would not be otherwise possible. The S-band has been calibrated through a side-by-side comparison with the Ka-band radar. In a typical cloud profiling mode of operation, the sensitivity is -14 dBZ at 10 km. Examples taken from a recent field campaign illustrate the profiler's ability to measure vertical velocity and radar reflectivity profiles in clouds and precipitation. C-band radar (Ron Brown) Raw data are stored on DVD Raw images are hourly reflectivity plots Go to scan.inf file for information on scan sequences available during EPIC2001 MM Cloud Radar Raw data are: Daily netcdf files of the moment data (30Mb 38% compression) Daily calibration files Daily moment files Raw images are daily 0,1,2 moment profiles Radar Wind Profiler On the Ron Brown there is a unique electronic stabilized wind profiler. This system automatically corrects for ship motion On most other ships a mechanically stabilized antenna profiler is used Both of these systems use Vaisala LAPXM operating software and produce similar outputs. Raw data include: SpecMom Daily *.spc spectra files 4Gb CASPER (These files are binary and need to be read into the CASPER dbase to extract ASCII data files) 25 2 hrly *.25c shipmotion data fm dbase extract 14 12 hrly *.14c realtime wind fm dbase extract Raw images are: Daily wind barb plots for each mode (png and MATLAB fig) Daily 0,1,2 moment profiles (surfer plots and MS PPt) Daily ship's heading and speed plots (png and MX PPT) Maybe balloon vs profiler comparisons U of Miami Radars http://ams.confex.com/ams/annual2002/6IOS/abstracts/28768.htm http://www.rsmas.miami.edu/divs/mpo/About_MPO/Seminars/0405_Ghate_Abstract.pdf