Post on 03-Jan-2020
NASA Airborne Platforms and Instrumentation Relevant to
Tropical Cyclones
Dan Cecil NASA Marshall Space Flight Center
Daniel.J.Cecil@nasa.gov
Alti
tude
(fee
t)
60000
70000
80000
0 1000 2000 3000 4000 5000 >6000
Range (nm)
ER-2
S-3B
DC-8 Lear 25
Ikhana
Global Hawk
C-20/G-III
B-200/UC12
NASA Earth Science Research Capable Aircraft (2016)
Falcon
WB-57
10000
20000
30000
40000
50000
C206
JSC AFRC
LaRC
WFF ARC GRC
P-3
Sherpa C-130
SIERRA/Viking (8)
UH-1 Huey
Twin Otter
Dragon Eye (75)
WB-57: Aging aircraft, but great performance in TCI 2015 ER-2: Overflies almost any weather; satellite simulator DC-8: Upper-level microphysics and remote sensing Global Hawk: ~24-h duration. Moving to Block 10 from the initial prototypes.
Hurricane Imaging Radiometer (HIRAD) 2015 Science Flights (ONR TCI project on WB-57)
Patricia
Marty
Joaquin
Surface Wind Speed Retrievals in Hurricanes Marty, Joaquin, and Patricia
High-Altitude Imaging Wind and Rain Airborne Profiler (HIWRAP)
NASA Global Hawk: 19 km altitude, 24 hours
HIWRAP Characteristics: • Conically scanning. • Simultaneous Ku/Ka-band &
two beams @30 and 40 deg • Winds using precipitation &
clouds as tracers. • Ocean vector wind scatter-
ometry similar to QuikScat.
MEASUREMENTS: Map the 3-dimensional winds and precipitation within
hurricanes and other severe weather events. Map ocean surface winds in clear to light rain regions
using scatterometry.
HIWRAP Views Hurricane Karl During GRIP
1 km
8 km
5 km
• HIWRAP made 20 crossings of Hurricane Karl on September 17, 2010 during GRIP over 14 hours.
• Doppler line of sight wind measurements are continually profiled during the conical scans.
• Horizontal winds are calculated from Doppler winds from multi look angles as the Global Hawk passes across the storm.
Horizontal winds (m/s) and reflectivity (dBZ) derived from one pass across Hurricane Karl’s
eye/eyewall region
EYE
HIWRAP Measurement Geometry
Eyewall
Grid is at 1.5 km x 1.5 km x 0.150 km intervals
6
Wide swath from NASA MSFC’s HIRAD (left panels) quickly maps the wind structure of the hurricane. Narrow sampling from operational instruments (right panels) requires several passes by the aircraft.
HIWRAP VAD wind assimilated
HIRAD surface wind plus HIWRAP VAD wind assimilated
HIRAD surface wind, dropsonde wind, and HIWRAP VAD wind assimilated
HIRAD Wind Retrievals Hurricane Imaging Radiometer
Assimilation graphics courtesy Jason Sippel
Least realistic
Most realistic
Gonzalo 2014
Karl 2010
ER-2 over Hurricane Emily (2005)
EDOP
AMPR Precipitation Index Based on 10, 19, 37, 85 GHz
GOES IR