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Satellite

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Adminis-tration (NOAA) announced that the environmental satellite NOAA-16, featuring improved imaging and sounding capabilities, replaced NOAA-14 on 20 March 2001.

NOAA-16, which successfully completed

engineer-ing and instrument calibration, is a Polar-Orbitengineer-ing Operational Environmental Satellite (POES). The sec-ond in a series of five POES satellites, it was launched 21 September 2000, and will operate over the next 10 years. The satellite it replaces, NOAA-14, was launched in December 1994. Like other NOAA satel-lites, NOAA-16 collects meteorological data and trans-mits the information to users around the world to enhance weather and climate forecasting. In the United States, the data are used primarily by NOAA's Na-tional Weather Service (NWS) for its 3 - 1 0 - d a y weather forecasts and 30-90-day climate outlooks.

"With NOAA-16, we will get better measurements of atmospheric temperature and moisture values," said Mike Mignogno, NOAA's POES program manager. "These translate into better information, particularly in the troposphere, five to ten miles above the earth's sur-face. The result will be accurate, global, tropospheric temperature and moisture data under all sky conditions."

The POES satellites orbit the earth from pole to pole, providing images of cloud cover, vertical tem-perature and humidity profiles, surface parameters such as sea surface temperature, snow, ice, and veg-etation, and space environment parameters. The sat-ellite also carries search-and-rescue instruments that are used internationally in locating ships and aircraft in distress. The use of satellites in search-and-rescue has been instrumental in saving more than 11,000 lives since the inception of the Search and Rescue Satellite-Aided Tracking system in 1982.

The satellites are operated by NOAA's National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Ser-vice in Suitland, Maryland. NOAA operates two po-lar-orbiting and two geostationary environmental satellites. Currently, NOAA-15 and NOAA-16 are the

two polar-orbiting satellites and 8 and

GOES-10 are the two geostationary satellites. NOAA also

operates satellites in the Defense Meteorological Sat-ellite Program.

NOAA and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) work together to develop and launch NOAA's environmental satellites. NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, is responsible for the construction, integration, and verification testing of the satellite, instruments, and ground equipment. NASA also arranges launch of the satellites with the U.S. Air Force.

Tsunami Education a Priority in Hawaii and West Coast States

The recent earthquake in Seattle should serve as a wake-up call to the looming, deadly threat of tsuna-mis, said Charles McCreery, director of NOAA's Pa-cific Tsunami Warning Center. "We cannot accurately predict when and where earthquakes will occur, but we can determine if a tsunami is generated and help the public learn how best to protect themselves and their families from harm."

NOAA's NWS operates two tsunami warning cen-ters. The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in Ewa Beach, Hawaii, conducts research and monitors tsu-namis for Hawaii and U.S. and international interests in the Pacific Basin. The West Coast and Alaska Tsu-nami Warning Center in Palmer, Alaska, has warning responsibility for Alaska, British Columbia, Washing-ton, Oregon, and California. The centers work very closely with state emergency managers, the U.S. Geo-logical Survey, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency to mitigate potential tsunami hazards.

major tsunamis occurred in different parts of the world and over 197,000 lives were lost in these storms.

The most devastating tsunamis in Hawaii's history were generated by distant earthquakes and arrived sev-eral hours later. With today's fast speed communica-tions systems used by the Tsunami Warning Centers, distant tsunamis can be announced with adequate time to evacuate.

But even advanced technologies cannot predict a tsunami caused by a nearshore source in time for wide public notification. In these situations, the earthquake itself could provide the earliest warning. After the ground stops shaking, people near coastal areas should move to higher ground or inland immediately. An earthquake or underwater landslide close to shore could generate a tsunami within minutes.

Strides are being made in tsunami education and research. Following Hawaii's example, tsunami sci-entists are developing inundation models and evacu-ation maps in West Coast states. Hawaii's maps are published in the county phone directories and show where shelters are located. Alaska is developing inun-dation maps for Kodiak, Women's Bay, and Homer-Seldovia. California has completed mapping for San Diego, Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, and San Fran-cisco-San Mateo, and is working on the central coast. The Coos Bay, Oregon, inundation map is finished and maps for Waldport, Rockaway, and Florence are in preparation. Washington is completing maps for Juan de Fuca St., Port Townsend, Port Angeles, Neah Bay, La Push, and Puget Sound.

With assistance from NOAA's National Tsunami Hazard Mitigation Program, new tsunami curriculum and video instruction has been developed for Wash-ington, Oregon, and California schools. Earthquake and tsunami evacuation drills are conducted regularly in Washington and Oregon schools. Tsunami interpre-tive signs have been installed along coastal areas in Hawaii, survivor stories are being collected and filed, and computer modeling for distant-source and local-source tsunamis is in progress. NOAA's Pacific

Ma-CERTIFIED CONSULTING METEOROLOGISTS

602 Jay Rosenthal 2001

rine Environmental Lab in Seattle, Washington, op-erates four deep-water tsunami detection buoys off the coasts of Alaska and Oregon that transmit live wave data to the Tsunami Warning Centers. Seismic net-works are being upgraded.

"We know a great deal about tsunamis and there is more to learn," said McCreery. "But all this knowl-edge does not matter if the public is not aware of the danger. Our goal is not to alarm, but to remind the public about safety precautions."

Temperature of Earth's Highest Polar Clouds Measured for the First Time

Scientists have for the first time obtained measure-ments of upper atmosphere temperatures, iron densi-ties, and mesospheric clouds over the North and South Poles. They used a sensitive lidar (radar-like laser) sys-tem, which was first deployed over Okinawa, Japan, to observe meteor trails during the 1998 Leonid me-teor shower. University of Illinois (UI) researchers have now used it to probe temperatures in the upper atmosphere over both geographic poles.

"Measuring temperature profiles over the poles is essential for validating global circulation models and for providing a baseline for assessing the impact of global warming over the coming decades," said team leader Chester Gardner, a professor of electrical and computer engineering. "Until now, we were limited to measurements taken with balloon-borne sensors to altitudes of less than 32 kilometers."

In collaboration with scientists at the Aerospace Corporation and the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), Gardner and his UI colleagues— Professor George Papen, research scientist Xinzhao Chu, and graduate student Weilin Pan—developed a more robust lidar system for measuring temperature profiles from the middle of the stratosphere (about 32 km up) to the lower thermosphere at the edge of space (about 110 km above earth). The system uses two pow-erful lasers operating in the near ultraviolet region of the spectrum and two telescopes to detect the laser pulses reflected from the atmosphere.

The researchers use two techniques for determin-ing temperature. For altitudes up to 80 km they mea-sure the amount of laser light reflected from air molecules to derive the temperature profile. For higher altitudes, they measure the scattering of the laser beams from iron atoms deposited in the upper atmo-sphere by vaporized meteors.

In June 1999, the scientists flew the lidar system over the North Pole aboard an NCAR research plane

to obtain temperature and iron density measurements during the Arctic Mesopause Temperature Study. Six months later, they took the i n s t r u m e n t to the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station where it is now measuring the atmospheric temperature structure throughout the year. The National Science Foundation provided funding for the two measurement campaigns. "Temperature profiles obtained in the thermosphere over the North Pole on 21 June 1999 and in the meso-pause region over the South Pole on 27 January 2000 agreed closely with model predictions," Gardner said. "Significant departures from the model were observed during the austral fall, however. On 8 May 2000, for example, the lower mesosphere was about 20°C warmer and the upper mesosphere was about 20°C cooler than predicted." The mesosphere extends from the upper limit of the stratosphere, around 80 km above sea level to the mesopause, its upper boundary. The thermosphere begins beyond the mesopause.

Gardner and his colleagues also measured the heights of polar mesospheric clouds that formed over each of the poles during midsummer. Unlike the lower atmosphere, the upper atmosphere is colder during summer than in winter. Polar mesospheric clouds form

over the summertime polar caps when temperatures fall below-125°C.

These clouds are the highest on earth, forming at an altitude of about 84 km. Their brightness and geo-graphic extent have been increasing during the past four decades. Scientists believe that these changes may be related to increasing levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide and methane, which in the upper atmosphere lead to cooler temperatures and increasing levels of water vapor.

Surprisingly, the altitudes of the polar mesospheric clouds over the South Pole were consistently 2 - 3 km higher than those over the North Pole. "Higher polar mesospheric clouds may be an indication of stronger upwelling in the summer mesosphere over Antarctica compared with the North polar cap," Gardner said. "Stronger upwelling would result in a cooler meso-pause region."

NWS Reminds Americans to Be Prepared for Tornado Season

Every year about 70 Americans are killed by tor-nadoes and 1500 people are injured. An average of

1200 tornadoes cause more than $400 million in

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age annually to homes, businesses, schools, and churches. Considered nature's most violent storms, peak tornado activity occurs during the months of March through early July.

NOAA forecasters and researchers from Norman, Oklahoma, in the heart of tornado alley, marked the beginning of tornado season recently, highlighting

Tornadoes of the Middle West

(Read before the American Meteoro-logical Society at Kansas City, Missouri, December 1925.)

This meeting of the AMS is the first ever held so near what is often des-ignated the " T o r n a d o Belt" of the United States. Were this one of the ab-normally warm, "sticky" days that so often occur in spring at Kansas City and vicinity and if, in addition, the weather map this morning showed an area of low atmospheric pres-sure in the west or north, with pronounced differences in temperature between areas a few hundred miles southeast of here and those a few hundred to the northwest, there might be good reason for anxiously watch-ing any black clouds above the southwest horizon. If this were an assembly of men whose chief knowledge of tornadoes had been gathered from highly sensational newspaper accounts of "Kansas cyclones" and if the icy hand of winter had not tem-porarily banished the conditions that give rise to this most spectacular type of storm that strikes inland America, the majority present might be excused for having a pan-icky feeling were the sky to become sud-denly threatening.

Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc., 7, 81.

better warnings from significant advances in weather technology made in the past 10 years and encourag-ing all Americans to be prepared for severe weather. Following two years with high numbers of torna-does, the year 2000 was relatively quiet. However, two outbreaks illustrated the fact that tornadoes can hap-pen anywhere at any time. On 13 February 2000, a tornado raged through Camilla, Georgia, causing 11 deaths. Six weeks later, a tornado struck Ft. Worth, Texas, killing five people on March 28.

New technology developed by NOAA researchers has helped NWS forecasters provide significantly bet-ter warnings when tornadoes strike. However, warn-ings do not work if people do not heed them and take action to protect themselves and their property, said Mike Foster, meteorologist-in-charge of the NWS Forecast Office in Norman.

Ten years ago, the NWS Forecast Office in Norman began the first operational test of the new Doppler weather radar, called the WSR-88D, developed by NOAA's National Severe Storms Laboratory (NSSL), also located in Norman. At that time, the NWS's av-erage tornado warning lead time was six minutes. Now, with radars installed throughout the country, tornado warning lead times have nearly doubled, improv-ing to an average of 10 minutes in 2000. In fact, strong and violent tornadoes rarely strike without warning.

This spring, the Norman Forecast Office will again test new radar technology being developed by NSSL, Foster said. The new dual-polarization radar uses two pulses instead of one, providing more information for forecasters to better predict flash floods, hail, and win-ter weather. Polarimetric technology could be added to the current WSR-88D Doppler weather radars used by the NWS throughout the nation.

"By combining new technology with experienced forecasters and rigorous training programs, the NWS expects to maintain its excellent tornado warning lead time average and continue decreasing the death tolls," said Bill Proenza, director of the N W S Southern Region.

Cooler than Normal Winter in Much of United States

The winter of 2000-01 was cooler than normal in the contiguous United States, NOAA scientists an-nounced recently. Using the world's largest database at N O A A ' s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, North Carolina, the scientists calculated conditions for the meteorological winter, December through February.

Preliminary data indicate this was the first colder-than-average winter since 1993-94. This is in contrast to the previous two winters, which were the two warm-est in the United States on record. On the other hand, the average statewide winter temperature in Alaska was the warmest since records began in 1918.

As a whole, the nation had the thirteenth-driest win-ter on record, particularly in the Northwest and Southeast, with Florida suffering from severe long-term drought. In contrast, above-normal precipita-tion fell in much of the central United States during the winter, with widespread record snowfall stretch-ing from Amarillo, Texas, to Buffalo, New York, in December.

The nationally averaged December through Febru-ary temperature in the contiguous United States, based on preliminary calculations, was 31.8°F, which is 1.2°F cooler than average. This made it the 26th coolest winter since national records began in the win-ter of 1895-96.

The winter began with record or near-record cold across much of the nation in December as arctic air spread from the Rocky Mountains to the East Coast behind a series of strong cold fronts. Severe winter storms and record snowfall were common in this month. Milder winter conditions were generally present across the United States during January and February, with eastern and southern regions of the nation warmer than average in February.

For the nation as a whole, the dry conditions of the winter of 2000-01 contrast with a general trend toward higher precipitation amounts that have been observed during the past 50 years. Drier-than-normal conditions prevailed across a large part of the eastern and west-ern sections of the nation, most notably in the South-east and Northwest, while precipitation from the front range of the Rocky Mountains eastward to the Mis-sissippi River was above average. North Carolina, Washington, and Oregon experienced their second-driest winter on record.

Florida experienced its third-driest winter season on record, one year after its driest year ever. The cumu-lative effects of almost three years of below-average rainfall in the state have resulted in the worst long-term drought since the 1930s, as measured by the Palmer Drought Index. Impacts from the drought include wild-fires, record low lake levels (including Lake Okeechobee), and emergency mandatory water-use restrictions in many Florida communities. Over 1300 wildfires have burned more than 83,000 acres across Florida since 1 January 2001.

Much of the Pacific Northwest experienced the fourth dry month in a row in February 2001. This per-sistent dryness occurred during what is typically the wet season, and resulted in the second driest Novem-ber-February on record during the 2000-01 season. Only the winter of 1976-77 was drier in this area of the nation. Reservoir levels continue to be generally below normal, and mountain snowpack in many river basins continues to be less than 70% of normal at the end of February with totals less than 50% of normal in some basins.

Scientists Link Atlantic Ocean Temperatures to South Florida Long-Term Flood/Drought Cycles

In the coming decades, droughts may be less fre-quent in Florida, according to a new study by scien-tists that links slow, multidecadal changes in North Atlantic Ocean temperatures to North American rain-fall and river flows.

Water Management District (SFWMD) have known for years that short-term climate patterns such as El Nino greatly affect yearly rainfall. But this study looks at North Atlantic sea surface temperature shifts be-tween warm and cool phases that last two to four de-cades each.

According to the scientists, central and southern Florida receive more rainfall during multiyear periods when the North Atlantic is warm. For example, a

10-HISTORICAL NOTE

year average inflow to Lake Okeechobee during warm phases is 40% greater than for cool phases. For most of the past 30 years the North Atlantic has been cool and Florida has had less rainfall. Current data suggest that a transition to warm conditions is under way. The result may be less frequent droughts in Florida, but more frequent flooding. By adapting water manage-ment strategies to this North Atlantic climate pattern, water managers hope to better meet the competing objectives of flood control, water supply, and environ-mental enhancement.

"Southern Florida's natural ecosystems benefit greatly from this newly found relationship," said Paul Trimble of the Hydrologic Systems Modeling Depart-ment at the SFWMD. "Climate variability affects the evolution and needs of the natural systems that depend on water availability. Understanding these climate factors will allow us to make operating decisions on flood protection and water supply sooner and less abruptly. This will help us manage south Florida's precious natural ecosystems in a less intrusive, more friendly manner."

Added David Enfield of AOML, "As North Atlan-tic temperatures rise, the increased rainfall may take the form of fewer droughts and/or more frequent flood-ing, although occasional droughts may still occur. Such extreme events can be likened to the effects of occasional large waves that alternately crash on a beach at different phases of the tide. Storm waves are less likely to produce damage during low tide than during high tide, but some damage will still occur."

The observed link between temperatures and wet and dry cycles is but a general indicator and does not take into consideration issues such as global warming or changing land use. As Enfield warns, "We can only make these projections based on a natural cycle ob-served in the past when land use and development pressures were much less. We may now be entering an era so affected by human changes that the natural cycle will be swamped."

This climate research is being done in cooperation with the SFWMD. Research scientists at AOML are learning about the role that climate variability plays in regional water management decisions and the po-tential benefits possible from improved seasonal to multiseasonal climate forecasts. This new perspective of the application of climate forecasts will allow the results of research to be used more effectively on fu-ture water management strategies.•

In April and May of 1974, a small delegation of AMS members spent two weeks in the People's Republic of China on invitation from the Chinese Meteorological Society (see the

Bulletin, Vol. 55, No. 11). It was the first ever

visit by an American technical meteorological group to China. At the recent AMS Annual Meeting in Albuquerque, New Mexico, the origi-nal delegation, minus one member, was able to reunite and recall their historic trip. From left to right, the couples are: Richard J. and Joan Reed, William W. and Elizabeth Kellogg, Kenneth C. and Margaret Spengler, and David and Lucille Atlas. The other member of the delegation, Dave Johnson, was unfortunately unable to attend the meeting.