Editor: Jim Elliott
Contributor:Stephanie Kenitzer
Copy Editor: Anne Siefken
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The 80th Annual Meeting was a great success both from the scientific exchange in the conferences, and the many committee meetings and informal discussions that occurred, according to many of the attendees. And, from the AMS staff's point of view, it was logistically the most trouble-free annual meeting in memory. It is difficult to list all of the highlights, but certainly NASA Administrator Dan Goldin's keynote address, and NOAA Administrator Jim Baker's luncheon speech have to be at the top of the list. The Presidential Symposium organized by President George Frederick, the Second Environmental Applications Symposium, was extraordinarily popular.
As has become customary, there were many international attendees present: more than 320 representatives from 41 countries, headed by Secretary General G.O.P.Obasi and President John Zillman of the World Meteorological Organization, the Directors of the WMO Secretariat, and representatives of WMO's six Regional Associations. Mr. Rene Morin, president, and Mr. Arne Spekat, executive secretary, of the newly formed European Meteorological Society, were also present.
The Annual Awards Banquet was a great success, with an efficiently run program that ended promptly at 9 p.m. Thanks to all the award winners, to President George Frederick, and to Fritz Hasler of NASA, who was responsible for the stunning audio–visual display.
Next year in Albuquerque, New New Mexico, the Annual Meeting will follow a different format. Instead of 12–15 independent conferences occurring simultaneously, there will be two themed symposia: one on climate variations, and one on extreme precipitation events. Each will be four days, Monday–Thursday, and will have sessions ranging from observations through theory, modeling, forecasting, applications, societal impacts, and policy implications. Most oral presentations will be invited; most contributed presentations will be in poster form. All posters will be on display all week for easy viewing, and each cluster of posters will have at least two viewing times when the author will be there to discuss the presentation. On Wednesday morning, President Jeff Kimpel plans to have a policy session, with the entire meeting in plenary.
In addition to these symposia, there will be a small number of regular conferences, such as IIPS, Education, and Global Change. Overall, however, the 81st Annual Meeting will have fewer parallel sessions, and therefore the attendees will not be pulled in as many directions. This change represents implementation of the recommendations of the Ad Hoc Committee on Meetings, chaired by Professor Roger Wakimoto of UCLA.
The 81st Annual Meeting will end on Thursday night, and plans are being made to put together recreation packages for attendees on Friday and the following weekend. See you in Albuquerque!
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from Keli Tarp, NOAA Public Affairs
NOAA Administrator D. James Baker has unveiled new steps his agency plans in climate services as we move further into the new century.
As the luncheon speaker at the AMS 80th Annual Meeting in Long Beach, California, Baker said the NOAA "is committed to advancing a climate services program significantly in coming years. I believe the commitment to provide climate services is as important to our society as that which led to the modernization of the weather service and the excellent forecasts we have today." The topic, he said, has a rich history. "Scholars have shown that societies are shaped by climate.”
Today, he continued, we have modernization and forecasts moving to longer times. "We have moved to seasonal forecasts," he said. "Based on the work of a broad group of scientists, NOAA, with the leadership of Ants Leetmaa, was able to put out a six-month forecast of the 1997–98 El Niño and the subsequent La Niña. That year...was a watershed event in the relationship between society and the climate system." He said NOAA is developing a three-step plan to "fix what is broken, implement new observations, and focus on next-step research."
The first step will involve enhancing operational forecast modeling, providing ship and aircraft support, filling gaps in the climate reference network and the cooperative network, operationalizing and expanding trace gas monitoring, improving long-term ocean observations, and getting base support for data systems, he said.
An NOAA Council on long-term climate monitoring is making good progress on the second goal of implementing new observations, Baker said. Plans include enhanced oceanic and atmospheric observations, technology development, and satellite sensing.
Future NOAA research, Baker said, will focus on understanding the earth's climate system, composition and chemistry of the atmosphere, carbon cycle science, the global water cycle, and human dimensions of global change.
Baker stressed that for the program to succeed, NOAA has to deliver new services and assessments. Already, he explained, NOAA is issuing and developing a variety of new products: drought and hurricane outlooks, threats assessments, a climate system model output database, regional integrated assessments and modern and paleoclimatic datasets, with data available on the Internet.
NOAA also expects to address the computational challenges in climate modeling, climate change detection and attribution, and high-impact weather and climate events, he said.
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NASA Administrator Daniel S. Goldin called on American Meteorological Society members to work toward a future where accurate, 14-day forecasts are commonplace and temperature and precipitation patterns of a growing season can be predicted.
New technologies being developed to make these capabilities possible will "revolutionize the work of AMS members," Goldin said in his talk at the AMS 80th Annual Meeting in Long Beach, California. Goldin also challenged the audience to push the boundaries of traditional approaches and tools and seek new ways to move meteorology ahead. "If you are going to be reluctant about pressing the boundaries, you're taking away from the future of this planet," Goldin said. "My challenge to you is to find ways to work together even more effectively—find ways to integrate the work of short-term and longer-term researchers with the contributions of broadcast meteorologists and those doing data analysis, and the development of satellite systems."
NASA's earth science activities focus on understanding climate forcings, climate response to those forcings, and the processes that connect the two, said Goldin. The Earth Observing System "Terra" satellite, launched in December, will study two of the biggest unknowns in climate forcings—clouds and aerosols. Instruments on the upcoming EOS-PM "Aqua" spacecraft, to be launched at the end of the year, "should help us work toward better, smaller, lighter, and simpler temperature profiling instruments for future operational satellites."
In terms of climate responses, Goldin emphasized that research needs to move beyond temperature change to other responses, such as precipitation and ocean surface winds. Key to the future of weather and climate forecasting will be the development of much more powerful computers, Goldin stated. "If we are to move into a future where meteorology becomes even more effective—improving safety and enhancing life—our modeling and simulation systems need to be even better than they are today." According to Goldin, NASA is working with Silicon Graphics to develop major advances in supercomputers. "Small evolutionary changes aren't going to cut it," he emphasized.
A new approach to satellite observing systems will also be needed, Goldin said, that moves beyond the current suite of multiple geostationary satellites. New satellite and instrument technology is needed to provide a more global view. Goldin envisions two satellites in Lagrangian orbits far from earth to provide continuous, full-disk views of Earth both day and night with high-resolution sensors.
In response to a question from John W. Zillman, president of the World Meteorological Organization, Goldin strongly supported the free flow of earth science data between scientists around the world. He promised to advocate the concept with NASA's international partners.
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In a wide-ranging press briefing at the AMS Annual Meeting in Long Beach, California, three speakers underscored what significant impact weather can have on business and the economy.
Titled "The Business of Weather," the press briefing featured Bob Dischel, a consultant on securities; Ronald Keener Jr., from the Duke Power Company in North Carolina; and Doug Jonas, of the Matrix Management Corp., of Bainbridge Island, Washington. Introduced by AMS Executive Director Ron McPherson, the speakers talked about: the weather risk securities market and how weather-sensitive businesses have a new choice to reduce risk of losses in revenues; what a key role forecasting plays in the operations of utility companies and what an impact forecasts can have on revenues and services; and how weather information affects decision-making processes in the surface transportation industry.
Dischel explained that the weather risk market is a "true financial market." He said weather-sensitive businesses bet on the weather. The revenue of electric and gas utilities and heating oil distributors depend on outdoor temperatures, he explained. Those temperatures, he continued, vary from year to year, making business planning difficult. With the development of the weather risk market, weather-sensitive businesses have a new choice to reduce risk to revenue. They can "hedge" with these weather derivatives.
Keener explained that utilities base their daily generation on a load forecast of power demand in their respective areas and said that the load demand is very sensitive to ambient temperatures, dew point temperatures, cloud coverage, precipitation and winds. His company, he said, uses a load forecast model, which takes hourly forecasts of ambient temperatures and dewpoints and projects an hourly generation load out through eight days.
The load projection, he said, is used by a system-operating center to dispatch the available generation resources in the most economical manner. "The economic costs to utility operations are the costs associated with startup–shutdown of generation units, which can be the result of error in the short-term hourly temperature forecasts," he explained. "A conservative annual estimate of weather error costs associated with startup–shutdown of generation units is $8 000 000 for Duke Power."
Jonas pointed out that studies have shown there are more than 460 distinctly separate decisions made in surface transportation activities impacted by weather. As examples, he cited snow and ice conditions, saying that highway officials need to have a forecast with 12 hours lead time of frozen precipitation, pavement temperature, whether to be preceded or followed by rain, and followed by crosswinds greater than 15 miles an hour. With that information, he said, officials can determine whether snow or ice would accumulate, whether chemicals applied in advanced would wash off before the storm and whether the end of precipitation will bring aid or further consequences to maintaining trafficability.
Jonas also peered into the future predicting that sensors will be located along roadsides and even on vehicles that will be able to advise motorists what weather or other conditions they can expect to find as far as 60 miles or farther ahead of them. Some states, he said, already are experimenting with some of these systems.
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The AMS 80th Annual Meeting in Long Beach, California, last month generated news interest from the local California media to national attention. Representatives from the Long Beach Press Telegram, the San Jose Mercury News, the Orange County Register, and the Los Angeles Times attended sessions and wrote stories on some of the interesting and newsworthy papers presented at the gathering. In addition to this regional coverage, reporters from the Associated Press, USA Today Online, Discovery News Online, the History Channel, and the Weather Channel covered the meeting and special events. The stories focused on specific scientific papers and issues, presentations by NASA Administrator Dan Goldin and NOAA Administrator D. James Baker, and more broad coverage about the meeting of nearly 2000 meteorologists.
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The American Meteorological Society is seeking suggestions about improving benefits and services for our members in all segments of the private sector. Each suggestion received will be duly considered and evaluated for possible implementation as part of a Plan for Enhancing the Societal Benefits of Meteorology, Oceanography, and Hydrology. (For more information about this activity refer to page 331 of the February 2000 issue of theBulletin of the American Meteorological Society.) Please send any suggestions to:
American Meteorological Society
ATTN: Dr. R. Gary Rasmussen
45 Beacon St.
Boston, MA 02108-3693
E-Mail: GRasmussen@ametsoc.org
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President Clinton has announced he will seek a $2.8 billion increase in the "Twenty-first Century Research Fund" in his Fiscal Year 2001 budget. The increase includes a $1 billion increase in biomedical research at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and a $675 million increase for the National Science Foundation (NSF), the largest dollar increase in the Foundation’s 50-year history. The president outlined his plans in a speech at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, California, on 21 January.
In his remarks, Clinton said the investments would ensure that science and technology "will continue to fuel economic growth and allow Americans to continue to lead longer, healthier lives. These investments also will enable America to lead in the twenty-first century by increasing support in all scientific and engineering disciplines, including biomedical research, nanotechnology, information technology, clean energy, and university-based research.”
He said the investments also would help in educating America's high-tech workforce and provide new insights into the world around us.
Specific initiatives include:
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A National Research Council report indicates that despite differences in temperatures of the lower atmosphere and the earth's surface, strong evidence exists that warming of the earth's surface is "undoubtedly real."
The report, released during the 80th Annual Meeting of the AMS in Long Beach, California, in early January, examines the apparent conflict between surface and upper-air temperature, which has led to controversy over whether global warming is actually occurring.
The earth's surface temperature has risen about 0.4°–0.8°C (0.7°–1.4°F) in the last century, according to the report. However, data from satellites and balloon-borne instruments since 1979 indicate little, if any, warming of the low- to midtroposphere, the atmosphere extending up to about five miles above the earth's surface. Climate models generally predict that temperatures should increase at these upper-air levels as well as at the surface if increased greenhouse gases are causing the warming.
"The differences between the surface and upper-air trends in no way invalidates the conclusion that the earth's temperature is rising," said John Wallace, chair of the 11-member panel that wrote the report and professor of atmospheric sciences at the University of Washington in Seattle. "But the rapid increase in the earth's surface temperature over the past 20 years is not necessarily representative of how the atmosphere is responding to long-term, human-induced changes, such as increasing amounts of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. The nations of the world should develop an improved climate monitoring system to resolve uncertainties in the data and provide policy-makers with the best available information."
While a combination of human activities and natural causes has contributed to rising surface temperatures, other human and natural forces may actually have cooled the upper atmosphere, the report noted. Natural events such as the eruption of Mt. Pinatubo in 1991 tended to decrease atmospheric temperatures for several years. Burning coal and oil for energy produces tiny aerosol particles that can have a cooling effect, also. And upper-air temperatures can be reduced by depletion of ozone in the atmosphere. When these variables are accounted for in atmospheric models, satellite and balloon data more closely align with surface temperature observations, the report noted.
Other panel members included: John R. Christy, University of Alabama, Huntsville; Dian Gaffen, NOAA; Norman C. Grody, NOAA NESDIS; James E. Hansen, Goddard Institute for Space Studies; David E. Parker, Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction, United Kingdom; Thomas C. Peterson, NOAA National Climatic Data Center; Benjamin D. Santer, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory; Roy W. Spencer, Marshall Space Flight Center; Kevin Trenberth, NCAR; and Frank Wentz, Remote Sensing Systems.
The complete report is available on the NRC Web site at http://www.national-academies.org .
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If one uses the comparison outlined by NWS Director John J. Kelly Jr. in explaining how advanced a new NOAA supercomputer is and will be in the future, there can be little doubt the public can expect better weather forecasts ahead.
If a person used a hand-held computer, Kelly told a press conference in Washington on 18 January, 24 hours a day seven days a week, it would take them 500 years to accomplish the calculations that the new supercomputer can carry out in one second.
The new supercomputer, known as a 786 processor IBM System Parallel, replaces a Cray C-90 that served the NWS since 1994. The new computer is five times faster than its predecessor and, come September, will be 28 times faster, according to NOAA officials.
Currently, the IBM SP processes data at a speed of 690 billion instructions a second. When upgraded in September with even more advanced technology and additional processors, the supercomputer will process weather data at a speed of 2.5 trillion instructions a second.
The supercomputer, located at the Commerce Department's Census Bowie Computer Center in Bowie, Maryland, will improve the accuracy of local and national forecasts and warning lead times for potentially dangerous severe weather, officials explained.
"The new supercomputer puts us closer to reaching our goal of becoming America's no surprise weather service," Kelly said. "This gives our forecasters more sophisticated models of the atmosphere and oceans, which act as blueprints for upcoming weather patterns. On a daily basis, we should see a 10% improvement in predicting temperatures, humidity and pinpointing when, where, and how much rainfall will occur."
"The new supercomputer provides better data for more accurate seven-day forecasts and beyond," said Louis Uccellini, director of NOAA's National Centers for Environmental Prediction. "Forecasters now can apply research based on more data they will collect. They'll also be able to test new weather models more effectively and more quickly add new results into the forecast process."
Additional information on the supercomputers is available at http://www.nws.noaa.gov.
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A giant horseshoe pattern of higher than normal sea surface heights developing over the last year is beginning to dominate the entire western Pacific and Asiatic oceans, new imagery from the U.S.—French TOPEX/Poseidon satellite shows.
According to scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, studying the new data, these abnormally warm ocean temperatures, which contrast with a cool La Niña, may be part of larger, longer-lasting climate pattern.
The latest data, taken 30 December 1999–8 January 2000, show that this slower-developing condition covers most of the Pacific Ocean and has significant implications for global climate change, especially over North America, said Dr. William Patzert, an oceanographer at JPL.
"In contrast with the more spectacular but shorter duration El Niño and La Niña events, this multiple-year trend may be part of a decade-long pattern known as the 'Pacific decadal oscillation,'" Patzert said. "The persistence of these abnormally high and low Pacific sea surface patterns, along with warmer and colder than average ocean temperatures, tells us there is much more than an isolated La Niña occurring in the Pacific Ocean."
The Pacific decadal oscillation waxes and wanes approximately every 20–30 years, alternating between its present phase, with a warm horseshoe pattern of higher than normal sea surface heights connecting the north, west, and southern Pacific, and a cool wedge of lower than normal sea surface heights in the eastern equatorial Pacific. After that, the Pacific switches to the opposite phase, showing a reversal of the warm and cool regions; the horseshoe becomes cool and the wedge warms.
The strength of this climate trend is seen in the current TOPEX/Poseidon satellite image, available at http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/elnino .
Although it is too early to definitively label these basin-wide conditions as a strong, multiple-year Pacific decadal oscillation, the current image suggests that simple labels or explanations such as a continuing La Niña/El Niño climate condition could be misleading, Patzert said. In the coming year, scientists using TOPEX/Poseidon data will continue to monitor the development of these conditions and their implications for climate in the next several years.
The U.S.–French TOPEX/Poseidon mission is managed by JPL for NASA's Earth Science Enterprise, Washington, D.C. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
Sea surface temperatures, which directly affect the atmosphere on a daily basis, are available at http://psbsgi1.nesdis.noaa.gov:8080/PSB/EPS/SST/climo.html , and show the same warm and cool water patterns.
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In its annual summary, NOAA reported 1225 tornadoes took place in the United States in 1999, including six major outbreaks, half of which occurred at unusual times of the year, January and December.
The total was 200 fewer than reported in 1998 when the 1424 amounted to the busiest year on record. The 1999 total ranks the fourth highest since the agency's records began in 1950. Ninety-four deaths resulted from 29 killer tornadoes, the agency reported.
Tornadoes struck four major cities during the period: Little Rock, Arkansas, Cincinnati, Ohio, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, and Salt Lake City, Utah.
Sixty-eight tornadoes on 3 May in Oklahoma and Kansas contributed to May's monthly total of 325, the highest of the year. June followed with 275 tornadoes, and January was third with 216.
The January tornadoes ripped through the lower Mississippi and Tennessee Valleys, more than tripling the previous record of 50 in the first month of 1997.
The year began with a tornado outbreak on 1 and 2 January 1999 with 26 tornadoes in Texas and Louisiana that caused one death. On 17 January, 25 tornadoes killed eight people in Arkansas, Tennessee, and Missouri. Four days later, six people died as 104 tornadoes struck Arkansas, Louisiana, and Tennessee on 21 and 22 January.
The Cincinnati area was hit by an F-4 tornado on 5 April, which was part of an outbreak of 70 twisters that began the evening before and tracked across Nebraska, Iowa, Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio.
The most expensive tornado outbreak in U.S. history and the deadliest of the year occurred on 3 and 4 May in Oklahoma and Kansas. In less than 21 hours, 78 tornadoes touched down across the two states with as many as four tornadoes from different storms on the ground at once.
An F-5 tornado, the strongest on the Fujita scale, moved along a 38-mile path from Chickasha through south Oklahoma City and the suburbs of Bridge Creek, Newcastle, Moore, Midwest City, and Del City. With 8000 buildings damaged, the Oklahoma City tornado is the most expensive single tornado in history. The tornadoes killed 46 people, injured 800, and caused $1.5 billion in damage.
On 24 July, three people were killed when a tornado caused a tree to fall on a car in Cleveland. A rare tornado in Salt Lake City on 11 August killed one person. And Tropical Storms Dennis and Floyd caused small tornado outbreaks in Virginia and North Carolina on 4 and 16 September.
The final tornado outbreaks of the year occurred once again in the cool season. Six twisters killed two people in Chico, Texas, on 2 December, and an F-3 tornado moved through Bentonia, Mississippi, on 9 December.
Additional information on the 1999 tornado season is available at http://www.spc.noaa.gov
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NCAR scientists have joined researchers from the United States, Europe, Russia, and Japan in the largest international campaign ever mounted to learn more about ozone levels and the lifecycle in the upper atmosphere of the Arctic. The study was prompted by observations of very low levels of ozone in the Arctic stratosphere in recent winters.
SAGE III Ozone Loss and Validation Experiment (SOLVE), sponsored by NASA, is being conducted jointly with the European Commission-sponsored Third European Stratospheric Experiment on Ozone. Some 350 scientists are participating.
Begun in the Arctic darkness of November and continuing through March, the mission is timed to capture chemical changes in the atmosphere brought about by interaction with increasing solar radiation. As temperatures fall during Arctic winter, polar stratospheric clouds (PSCs) can form. A complex series of chemical reactions on the surface of PSC cloud particles frees up active chlorine and bromine, which react with sunlight to catalyze ozone destruction when the sun returns in early spring, according to scientists.
The sources of chlorine and bromine are human-produced chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and halocarbons. The colder the Arctic spring, the longer the clouds linger and the more ozone loss.
Scientists need to understand the complex interactions among solar radiation, temperature, water, CFCs, aerosol particles, and polar stratospheric clouds before predictions of ozone loss in the Northern Hemisphere can become reliable, scientists explained.
An array of research instruments aboard NASA's DC-8 and ER-2 aircraft is taking measurements in flight and bringing back air samples for testing in the laboratory. Several European aircraft also are participating, and instruments carried up to 100 000 feet by research balloons will take additional measurements. Instruments on the ground in Sweden and Norway will round out the profile of the Arctic stratosphere, according to officials.
The Antarctic ozone hole and its causes made news in the 1980s. In the late 1990s, however, scientists detected dramatically lower levels of ozone over the Arctic, raising concerns about the possibility of a second ozone hole above the North Pole.
More information is available online at the SOLVE home page: http://cloud1.arc.nasa.gov/solve
THESEO 2000 home page: http://www.ozone-sec.ch.cam.ac.uk
NASA media guide: http://george.arc.nasa.gov/dx/basket/factsheets/FS991103.html
Atmospheric chemistry research at NCAR: http://www.acd.ucar.edu
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NASA scientists have completed the first globally complete long-term dataset for use in understanding El Niño/La Niña events. The dataset, part of the Global Precipitation Climatology Project (GPCP), is a result of rainfall analysis that examines precipitation monthly around the globe over a 20-year period.
This data is a result of combining information from a number of polar orbiting satellites, geosynchronous satellites and rain gauge information to give the best analysis of global precipitation on a monthly timescale. According to GPCP Project Scientist Robert Adler, of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland, these globally averaged values and the regional and time-varying patterns are extremely important as validation for computer models of the global atmosphere.
"Before we can use these models to successfully predict El Niño's and other climate phenomena they must be able to reproduce these observations," stated Adler. " With this information, we can better understand these phenomena and the critical regional precipitation variations associated with them."
A global map of El Niño/La Niña variations shows that during El Niño there is an increase of precipitation extending from the central Pacific, across the southern United States, and across the Atlantic to the European coast. A decrease in rainfall is observed during El Niño events in New Guinea southeastward across the South Pacific all the way to the straits of Magellan between South America and Antarctica.
This new dataset and the associated techniques developed by the GPCP provide a more complete and more accurate picture of these large-scale climate variations. The results should spur both a better understanding of the phenomena and provide the observations that the models must reproduce in order to advance the prediction of these events.
The GPCP is part of the World Climate Research Program, under the auspices of the United Nations World Meteorological Organization, which provides guidance for international climate research. The GPCP is made up of atmospheric scientists from NASA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and other research institutions in the Unitec States, Europe, and Japan.
To find out more about this project visit this Web site: http://rsd.gsfc.nasa.gov/912/gpcp/gpcp.html
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NASA plans to launch a $153 million satellite this month to study on a global perspective the potentially disruptive magnetic storms that occur in the most heavily used orbits around Earth.
The mission, called Image (Imager for Magnetosphere-to-Aurora Global Exploration), is scheduled for launch from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California, on 15 February on a Delta 2 rocket. It is the first satellite dedicated to studying the Earth's magnetosphere, the magnetic field that surrounds the earth and is strongly influenced by solar wind. Magnetic storms have the potential to damage orbiting spacecraft, disrupting communication satellites and causing power blackouts on the ground.
"It's the first mission that's going to literally make movies of the magnetosphere," said George Withbroe, NASA science director for the Sun–Earth Connection in the Office of Space Science, in an article in the 10 January issue of Space News. "That's something that's never been done before."
The mission will be the first of NASA's Medium-class Explorer space science missions. Researchers say that making forecasts of these storms has been difficult because forecasters haven't had very good observations of changes in the magnetosphere.
The spacecraft, built by Lockheed Martin Missiles and Space in California, is equipped with three major instrument sets: a radio sounder for probing the boundaries of the magnetosphere, ultraviolet imagers for viewing the aurora, and a set of three neutral atom imagers to provide a global view of the inner magnetosphere under both quiet and storm conditions.
The spacecraft will be placed in an elliptical polar orbit as high as 43 000 kilometers above Earth.
Additional information is available at http://www.gsfc.nasa.gov.
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New research shows that the accuracy of three-day rainfall forecasts in the Tropics can be improved by as much as 100% by combining existing forecast models with satellite rainfall data. These findings were presented at the American Meteorological Society’s annual meeting in Long Beach, California, in early January. These findings also will be featured in an upcoming edition of the Journal of Climate.
Researchers at The Florida State University have found that by adding rainfall observations collected by NASA’s Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) satellite and other meteorological satellites to forecast models, they can more than triple the accuracy of rainfall predictions for the first 12 hours of the forecast.
In addition, they found that using the past rainfall data collected from defense meteorological satellites and NASA’s Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) spacecraft could be used to increase the forecast skill even further. Their method examines the behavior of a number of different forecast models and selects those properties from each model that lead to the true rainfall as observed by the TRMM satellite in the past. These model properties are then used to predict the rainfall for three days into the future with remarkable success.
These forecast results are based on five experiments each during 1–5 August 1998. The skill or accuracy was higher over all tropical regions. Scientists attribute this success to a combination of improved analyses available from the superensemble approach as well as the availability of accurate rainfall estimates over the Tropics from the TRMM satellite.
TRMM is NASA's first mission dedicated to observing and understanding tropical rainfall and how it affects the global climate. TRMM has produced continuous data since December 1997. Tropical rainfall, which falls between 35° north latitude and 35° south latitude, composes more than two-thirds of the rainfall on Earth.
For additional information on this story see ftp://pao.gsfc.nasa.gov/pub/PAO/Releases/2000/00-01.htm
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A. Thomas Young, retired executive vice president of Lockheed Martin Corp., has been named to chair the Mars Program Independent Assessment Team that will review the agency's approach to robotic exploration of Mars in the wake of the recent loss of the Mars Polar Lander mission.
The team will evaluate several NASA missions to deep space, including Mars Pathfinder, Mars Global Surveyor, Mars Climate Orbiter, Mars Polar Lander, Deep Space 1 and Deep Space 2, and is expected to report its findings by mid-March.
The investigation into the likely cause of the failure of the Mars Polar Lander mission will be conducted by an internal peer review at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, and submitted to the assessment team for its review. The Mars Polar Lander and Mars Climate Orbiter are part of a series of missions in a long-term program of Mars exploration managed by JPL. JPL's industrial partner is Lockheed Martin Astronautics, Denver, Colorado.
Other team members are James Arnold, deputy director, Aerospace Directorate, NASA Ames Research Center, California; Thomas Brackey, executive director for technical operations, Hughes Space and Communications Co., California; Michael Carr, planetary geologist, U.S. Geological Survey, Menlo Park, California; Douglas Dwoyer, associate director for research and technology competencies, NASA Langley Research Center, Virginia; Gen. Ronald Fogleman, U.S. Air Force (retired); Maj. Gen. Ralph Jacobsen, U.S. Air Force (Retired) and president emeritus of the Charles Stark Draper Laboratory; Herb Kottler, associate director, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Lincoln Laboratory, Massachusetts; Peter Lyman, consultant, Pasadena, California; Joanne Maguire, vice president for group development, TRW Space & Technology Group, California; Robert Pattishall, director of advanced systems and technology, National Reconnaissance Office, Virginia; Larry Soderblom, planetary scientist, U.S.G.S., Flagstaff, Arizona; Peter Staudhammer, vice president for science and technology, TRW Inc., Cleveland, Ohio; Kathy Thornton, assistant dean for graduate programs, University of Virginia, and retired NASA astronaut; Peter Wilhelm, director of the Naval Center for Space Technology, Washington, D.C.; Brian Williams, assistant professor, MIT Space Systems Laboratory, Massachusetts, and Maria Zuber, professor of geophysics and planetary sciences, MIT, Massachusetts.
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Kathryn Clement has been named deputy director of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). Her appointment was effective 1 January.
Formerly associate division chief for operations at USGS' National Mapping Division, Clement will oversee the upcoming strategic changes at the agency and perform the day-to-day managerial function of implementing programs and policies, according to USGS Director Charles Groat.
With nearly 20 years of experience at USGS, Clement led the Mapping Division's strategic and long-range program planning activities and participated in the revision of the agency's strategic plan.
She received her B.S. in forestry and wildlife management from VPI in 1977.
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Dr. Daniel R. Mulville, NASA's chief engineer since 1995, has been named the agency's associate deputy administrator. He replaces General John R. Dailey, who is leaving NASA to become head of the National Air & Space Museum.
As deputy associate administrator, Mulville will plan, direct, and manage the daily operations and reinvention activities of the agency. As NASA's chief engineer, Mulville has been responsible for overall review of the technical readiness and execution of all NASA programs, ensuring that development efforts and mission operations are conducted on a sound engineering basis.
Prior to his appointment as chief engineer, he was director of the Engineering and Quality Management Division in the Office of Safety and Mission Assurance. From 1986 to 1990, he was deputy director of the Materials and Structures Division in the Office of Aeronautics and Space Technology.
Before joining NASA, he served as the structures technology manager at the Naval Systems Command.
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