Editor: Jim Elliott
Contributors: Alan Weinstein, Ginny Owen, and Stephanie Kenitzer
Copy Editor: Anne Siefken
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After two years of extensive research, the American Meteorological Society is making a bold prediction—about its future. Planning ahead for the next millennium, the AMS Council recently adopted a 10-yr vision statement that outlines what kind of organization the AMS will be in the year 2010 and how it will best advance the sciences and services for its more than 11 000 members.
"The vision statement provides an outline of how the Society must adapt to keep up with the rapid pace of scientific, technological and economic change in the field of atmospheric and related oceanic and hydrologic sciences," said Ronald McPherson, AMS executive director. "It provides a specific roadmap for the organization into the next century."
The vision statement is the result of a two-year study conducted by AMS Planning Commission, jointly with the AMS Executive Council, under the leadership of Professor Charles Hosler of The Pennsylvania State University. The commission examined current and future trends in the field through primary and secondary research, meetings, surveys, documents, and other data. From these sources, the commission prepared a 10-yr vision study which painted a picture of the AMS today and what areas it must address to adjust to changes in its environment and in societal needs.
Specifically, the study notes four distinct areas the Society must address in the coming years in order meet the needs of its diverse membership and the science community. The areas are multidisciplinarity—expanding AMS activities that focus on the interactions of the atmosphere with the oceans, land surfaces, rivers and streams, and the near-space environment; inclusiveness—reaching out to a broader community including those who generate, apply and disseminate meteorological, oceanic, and hydrologic products and those who teach, generate software, or are weather enthusiasts; outreach— educating the general public, as well as those involved in setting public policy that governs the field; and communication/computer technology—maximizing the use of technology for all AMS programs and services.
"By examining the external and internal environment, we learned that these areas will have the greatest impact on who we are and what we can accomplish in the future," added McPherson. "Now we must make adjustments where necessary to remain the preeminent scientific and professional organization we have been for nearly 80 years."
The vision statement was adopted by the AMS Council on 10 January 1999, and the implementation process is underway. Several committees have begun the first phases of developing implementation plans including the Ad Hoc Committee on Meetings, the Ad Hoc Committee on the Bulletin, and the Ad Hoc Committee on Member Services. Each committee will review the vision study, statement, and determine how to best implement the recommendations and ideas brought forth by the commission.
"This is an exciting time for the Society," said McPherson. "The field of atmospheric sciences has undergone a tremendous evolution over the past 100 years. This is our call for an evolution within the organization to best represent this maturing scientific field."
The complete vision study, the adopted vision statement and details on the implementation committees is available on the AMS homepage at http://www.ametsoc.org
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Richard S. Greenfield, currently director of the National Science Foundation's Division of Atmospheric Sciences, will join the American Meteorological Society headquarters staff (AMS) as director of the Society's Atmospheric Public Policy Program. Greenfield will begin at the AMS Washington, D.C., office this fall.
The AMS Public Policy Program is a new initiative designed to foster research, education, and discussion about issues and policies related to the atmospheric and related oceanic and hydrologic sciences. Specifically the program will support scholarly research efforts and fora to address important policy questions and encourage informed policy decisions. In addition, the AMS will conduct workshops, seminars, and colloquia on policy issues aimed at today's meteorology students and midcareer scientists.
"The program will create an opportunity for dialogue and learning between policy makers and those in the science field, which is extremely critical as the atmosphere and way we use it becomes ever more significant to society," said Ronald McPherson, AMS executive director. "I can't think of a better candidate to head up this effort than Dick Greenfield. With more than 35 of years in the field of meteorology and his experience in shaping public policy, he will be an extremely valuable asset to the AMS and the science community."
Greenfield will retire as director of the Division of Atmospheric Sciences at the National Science Foundation around 1 October 1999. His tenure as director of the division has been important in influencing the direction of atmospheric research in this country. He has also been active in international meteorological circles and has served as a U.S. delegate to the World Meteorological Organization Congress and on various commissions, panels, boards, and planning meetings.
Prior to his 25-yr tenure at the NSF, Greenfield worked as a senior research scientist at Travelers Research Center and the Center for Environment and Man in Hartford, Connecticut. He also served as an assistant staff meteorologist at Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico, and the Air Force Ballistic Missile Division in Inglewood, California.
Greenfield earned his bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degrees in meteorology at New York University. An AMS Fellow, he has been a member of the AMS since 1962, serving on the Council and the Executive Committee. He has published more than 20 articles and reports on atmospheric gravity waves, numerical modeling of cloud processes, lower stratospheric and tropopause phenomena, and descriptions of various international scientific programs in publications of the AMS and American Geophysical Union. A native of New York, he and his wife reside in Northern Virginia.
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In a radio address on 8 May 1999, President Clinton applauded the work of the federal agencies who provide warnings of natural disasters and provide relief for their victims, and spoke of the need to increase funding for their work. He spoke in the wake of the devastating tornados that hit Oklahoma, Kansas, Texas, and Tennessee the first week of May, killing more than 50 people, injuring hundreds more, and destroying thousands of homes and businesses.
President Clinton applauded the dedication of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, saying, "Officials from FEMA and other federal agencies are already on the ground in communities hit by this week's tornados, healing wounds, searching for missing persons, providing shelter, clearing debris, restoring power and water, issuing emergency expense checks. But more must be done . . . "I'm also announcing today that I'll ask Congress for an additional $372 million for FEMA's disaster relief fund. These resources are crucial for our disaster relief efforts . . ."
The president continued by praising recent advances in science and technology that are proving effective in saving lives and property. "Finally, in the balanced budget that I sent to Congress, there is $10 million to further improve the National Weather Service's next generation Doppler network. This system makes it possible to issue warnings in advance of coming tornados so that local residents can seek shelter. Over the last decade, average warning times have doubled from six minutes to 12 minutes. Residents of hard-hit Cleveland County, Oklahoma, received warnings a full 35 minutes before the tornado touched down there this week, and that warning saved lives. That's also why I support the creation of a National Weather Center for state of the art tornado and severe storm forecasting at the University of Oklahoma."
Norman, Oklahoma, is already home to the University of Oklahoma's Center for Analysis and Prediction of Storms (CAPS) and NOAA's National Severe Storms Laboratory and Storm Prediction Center.
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The House Science Committee passed legislation authorizing NASA programs an increase over the president's request and an increase of approximately 1% per year over the next three years (FY2000–2002) for an authorized level of $41.2 billion over three years.
Both the International Space Station and space shuttle operations are fully authorized at the level requested by NASA. The bill, H.R. 1654, also provides additional funding for space shuttle upgrades, life and microgravity research, space science, advanced space transportation technology and education.
The committee adopted, by a 21–18 vote, an amendment by Reps. Dave Weldon (R-FL) and George Nethercutt (R-WA) that prohibits funding for the Triana program and transfers $32.6 million from the program to life and microgravity research. Supporters of the amendment were disturbed by Triana's failure to abide by peer-review and other merit-based practices established to ensure programs are prioritized on a scientific, rather than political, basis, according to a committee press release.
The NASA authorization legislation prohibits funding for Trans-Hab as a replacement for the habitation module, because of Trans-Hab's higher costs, the committee noted. In addition, the legislation provides definitions of commercial space policy terms and requires NASA to develop a plan for integration of R&D and experimental demonstration activities for aeronautics and space transportation technology.
Committee sources said the breakdown by fiscal year was $13.625 billion for FY2000; $13.747 billion for FY2001, and $13.839 for FY2002.
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National Science Foundation Director Rita Colwell outlined NSF's educational goals in testimony before the House Science Committee on 28 April, saying the agency is "committed to improving science and math achievement of all children in the United States, enabling all who have interest and talent to pursue scientific and technical careers at any level and supporting scientific literacy of all citizens."
In stating that objective, she underlined several steps that must be taken to achieve it. They include:
She pointed out that NSF has been supporting a number of those initiatives, advising the lawmakers that "all NSF programs—whether education or research—are really experiments." Later in her testimony, she said, "If I were asked to give one word that best describes NSF's education efforts for the future, I would have to say 'experimentation.'
"If we are to succeed in making our education system truly world class across our great and diverse nation, we must better integrate our research portfolio with the education we support. Integration of research and education means investing in inquiry-based, hands-on learning—that's a given. But integration also means investing in activities that are high risk, but that can bring high payoffs if ultimately successful. We must experiment, we must try new approaches."
Colwell told the committee that NSF was launching a new initiative, known as "Find Out Why"—a project designed to challenge people of all ages in discovering the science and technology found everywhere in their daily lives. In the future, she explained, NSF will focus on three critical areas: building better links with NSF research programs and K–12 education, promoting new strategies and collaborations for teacher preparation, and increasing research on learning. The challenges we face in education, she continued, "are difficult, no doubt, but they are not insurmountable."
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Also on 28 April, Colwell appeared before the House Basic Research Subcommittee to testify about the agency's FY2000 budget request. As she had testified before, the NSF director pointed out that while federal research investment has increased significantly in many fields, six-fold in current dollars since 1970, she said the "mix of investments" has changed dramatically, primarily through gains in biomedical fields and declines in the shares of physical sciences and engineering.
In 1970, she testified, life sciences accounted for 29% of federal research spending. By 1997, she said, their share had risen to 43%. Engineering, by contrast, she continued, saw its share decline by 12% over the same period, falling from 31% to 19% of the federal research portfolio. The share going to physical sciences dropped by more than 5%—from 19% to 14%.
"Engineering and the physical sciences, taken together," she explained, "accounted for 50% of the federal research spending in 1970. That's down to 33% today—a drop from half of the total to just one third."
The NSF budget request for FY2000 is $3.95 billion, a 5.8% increase over current year spending, including an 8% boost for research project support. She pointed out that the "headliner" in the budget request is information technology and explained that NSF will be putting $146 million into the Information Technology Initiative known as IT2.
A second budget initiative is biocomplexity, a multidisciplinary approach to understanding our world's environment. Because of our planet's complexity, she said, organisms and entire ecosystems in one region can be influenced dramatically by physical and chemical changes occurring thousands of miles away. That effort is expected to realize a payoff in better decision-making by governments, industries, and individuals through "ecological forecasting."
She said science and math education remain a high priority in the NSF budget and cited the Plant Genome Research Program, the Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation and a number of major infrastructure projects, such as modernizaton of the South Pole Station, as other basics in the budget.
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Speaking before a National Press Club luncheon audience, NSF Director Rita Colwell outlined advances brought about by information technology and how lives have been improved by them. However, in her address on 29 April, she emphasized that research in that field must continue if we are to realize the true benefits of that technology. Citing information technology as "fuel for our nation's economic engine," she said that today the Internet links 37 million computers and more than 150 million users. The technology, she explained, generated one-third of the recent growth in the U.S. economy, supporting 7.4 million jobs and paying wages "at least 60% higher than the private sector average."
High-techs' share of U.S. trade has doubled over 15 years from 9% in 1980 to 18% in 1995, she said. She indicated few Americans realize that key advances in this technology were spurred by federally sponsored research. As an example, she said NSF has invested "on the order of $500 million annually" in supercomputing networking and other information technology activities."
"Computing technology surrounds us," she explained, "yet, we've hardly begun to absorb the meaning of these changes in almost every phase of life. We assume that all this information makes us smarter. But, I suppose if you believe that, it's like believing that having a library card makes you well read...She continued, saying "I'd like to step beyond the bar code...We need to approach the avalanche of information with that rarer quantity— wisdom."
She recognized there are issues of privacy and security, citing the public's concern over Y2K and the uneasiness created by the "Melissa" and "Chernobyl" viruses. "The Web is truly worldwide," she explained. "By the beginning of the next century," she said, "less than half the material on the Web will be in English."
According to the National Research Council, she said, Internet traffic has doubled every year from 1989 to 1995 and is now doubling every six to nine months. There are predictions, she noted, that the density of transistors on microprocessors will double every two years. But, she said, there are obstacles to that trend.
"By the year 2005, we simply run out of physics to keep the doubling on track. We can't go any faster than the speed of light. Transistors can't become smaller than molecules. So, we need to look out toward a more distant horizon, toward visionary research on computing and communications. This may mean quantum computing or DNA computing.
"It makes sense, then, to look to science for the next stage in this revolution, because science and engineering are spurring it... I can comfortably say that no field of research will be left untouched by the current explosion in information.
"Science used to be composed of two endeavors, theory and experiment. Now it has a third component: computer simulation, which links the other two."
There exists a need to join discrete scientific cultures together to better reflect and probe the integration and wholeness of the world we study, she said. She quoted Larry Smarr, the head of one of NSF's national partnerships, as describing a rise in "effervescent" collaborations among scientific and engineering disciplines. The ultimate vision is to collect researchers into one "virtual room," she said, a single virtual laboratory with the interaction among colleagues being conducted in a "seamless digital theater."
"Computing and communications have blurred the boundaries between our work and our personal lives, between the government and its citizens and between nations," she said. "Doctors and patients now have access to the same information. Because e-mail rarely shows the sender's status, it soars over the levels of hierarchy... "Our embrace of information technology has already brought fundamental social change. Yet, we really are not aware of its magnitude...We marvel at how information technology makes the world seem smaller. At the same time, it has the potential to create new barriers, new inequities in our society...We imagine universal connectedness, with talk of 'tetherless networks' that anyone could tap into any time, anywhere. Conversely, we could also broaden the gap between the information rich and the information bereft.
"In our own nation, sociologists have identified groups whose access to telephones, computers, and the Internet lag well behind the national averages. These information gaps appear among nations as well. Indeed, most of those who live in the Third World have never used a telephone."
She explained that less than 2% of the world actually is on the Web. "If we subtract the United States and Canada," she said, "it's less than 1%."
She said sociologists and educators agree that "context" matters. Computers have different impacts on different settings, she said. "It's not simply a matter of wiring-up every school or putting a laptop into every lap. Having a PC at home might improve school performance for kids with high socioeconomic status. But a PC may not have much effect in poorer households...
"The great hope is that computerized tools will bring individualized learning to all—stimulating natural curiosity, providing access to the knowledge that's available in the world and helping everyone to learn in his or her own singular style.
"Information empowerment takes skill: information literacy. This is the ability to find, assess, and use information for decision making...This skill, one that grows ever more complex, yet necessary by the minute, should become everyone's right to possess, just like the ability to read is now.
"Surrounded by both hype and hope, the idea of unleashing computers for educational reform remains a vision. But it's one that needs to be pursued...Our challenge now is to design our digital future to reflect the light of the Information Age."
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from Richard M. Jones, American Institute of Physics
"Continuing the current distribution of appropriations could distort the nation's research portfolio with adverse long-term consequences for our country," states a new report from the National Academies of Sciences and Engineering and the Institute of Medicine. The 14-page report, produced by the Committee on Science, Engineering, and Public Policy, adds to what is becoming a topic being discussed more publicly in Washington—the imbalance of research funding.
The report looks at a different slice of the federal research pie, what it calls the federal science and technology (FS&T) portion of the annual R&D request. In the FY2000 submission, this is about $49 billion of the $78 billion overall R&D request. The report characterizes this FS&T budget as "the portion of the federal research and development budget that is aimed at investment in the creation of new knowledge and technologies." FS&T is defined more precisely as "the civilian and noncivilian research budgets for all agencies (including 6.1 and 6.2 at DOD) and the development budget for all agencies except DOD and DOE. For the development budget of the latter two agencies, only DOD 6.3 budget categories and the equivalent activities of the DOE atomic-energy defense programs are included in the FS&T budget. In addition, the FS&T budget includes R&D facilities and major capital equipment for R&D."
Looking at spending in constant dollars from FY94 to FY2000, the committee calculated the following changes:
FS&T excluding NIH: down 5.7%;
FS&T including NIH: up 3.3%;
Department of Defense FS&T: down 19.8%;
Department of Energy FS&T: flat;
National Science Foundation FS&T: up 15.85;
NIH FS&T: up 31.2%.
The committee analyzed the decline in spending in physical sciences and its consequences. It found, "From FY93 to FY98, federal obligations for research in the physical sciences decreased by 11.2% in constant dollars and for engineering increased by only 0.4%. It appears that budgets for mission agencies for FY99 and FY2000 would continue this trend." The report later notes, "Funding for the physical sciences relies heavily on DOD, NASA, and DOE, which together provide 33% of the federal funding for basic research. Additionally, DOD provides a large fraction of all computer science research funding and graduate education support. Because of its relatively small size, increases at NSF cannot compensate for the significant decreases at DOD or the other mission agencies. The downward trend at DOD could lead to a gradual erosion of such fields of research as the physical sciences and engineering, thus weakening the research enterprise."
The report concludes, "The nation must recognize the importance of investing in a balanced way across a broad range of fields to maintain the overall health of the science and technology portfolio. Recent increases in NSF funding cannot begin to compensate for the declines in funding of mission agencies. Such an unbalanced investment strategy will undermine two primary goals of our national research enterprise: that the United States perform at least at world-class levels in all major fields of science and engineering and that the United States should seek preeminence in a select number of fields."
The report can be accessed at http://pompeii.nap.edu/books/0309064872/html/index.html.
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The 13th World Meteorological Congress has reappointed Professor Godwin P. Obasi to serve as secretary-general of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). The new mandate of the secretary-general runs for a period of four years starting 1 January 2000.
John Zillman of Australia was uncontested in the election for president of the WMO. Jean-Pierre Beysson of France and Ramon A. Sonzini were also unopposed in their runs for reelection as first and third vice presidents. In the only other contested seat, Ali-Mohammad Noorian of Iran beat Dr. Victor Chub of Uzbekistan for relection as second vice president.
Representatives of 153 Members cast their votes in a ballot held 14 May to appoint one of three candidates running for the post of secretary-general of WMO, namely Professor Obasi, the present Secretary-General, Mr. Manuel Dengo, member of the delegation of Costa Rica to the 13th World Meteorological Congress and Dr. Gordon McBean, permanent representative of Canada with WMO. Professor Obasi won the first round of voting with 105 votes, a comfortable two third majority.
In his statement of acceptance Professor Obasi expressed his gratitude to all members for their confidence in and support for his leadership of the Organization. Professor Obasi said, "I consider it a singular honor and a privilege to be reappointed by the governments of the world. I therefore have the pleasure to express to all governments my heartfelt gratitude and appreciation for the unanimous renewal of confidence in me. I accept this renewed appointment with profound humility and a heightened sense of commitment to the ideals of our organization. As a citizen of Nigeria, I wish to express my special thanks to the government of Nigeria for its continued support over several years." Professor Obasi underlined that his reelection is an expression of confidence in the WMO Secretariat as a whole and therefore "I wish to thank all our secretariat staff for their devotion to duties and their contribution to the achievements of WMO", he said. "The secretariat represents a living example of friendly international cooperation which has been the strength of our organization," he added.
Professor Obasi also underlined the important role of the President of WMO, Dr. John W. Zillman and all bureau members and members of the executive council who have provided much advice and support. "I wish to express my appreciation to them and I look forward to their continued support and cooperation during the thirteenth financial period" Professor Obasi said, adding "I would also like to convey my heartfelt gratitude to the presidents of the regional associations and the technical commissions, who have competently led the affairs of their respective constituent bodies and have thus greatly helped in furthering the ideals of the organization." "Their exemplary cooperation," he pointed out " has been particularly instrumental in achieving the progress we have made in the scientific and technical programmes of the oprganization."
The secretary-general also underlined the immense responsibility and forward-looking leadership that is expected of the WMO secretary-general, especially in meeting the ever-growing challenges in atmospheric sciences, hydrology, the environment, and in related areas. "We must transform such challenges into opportunities for the further enhancement and strengthening of the national meteorological and hydrological services of all nations. Our performance in the early years of the next decade in responding effectively to these challenges will therefore be crucial to the future of our organization. For this reason, it is important that the members of our organization maintain unflinching solidarity to ensure that we march forward confidently to face the present challenges and those to be expected at the beginning of the twenty-first century," he concluded.
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While the pilots get most of the attention in reports of the air strikes in Yugoslavia and Kosovo, Air Force meteorologists have been playing the role of unsung heroes.
The Balkans are a forecaster's nightmare, according to a story in the 26 April issue of Air Force Times. Shifting fog and low clouds fueled by moisture from the Adriatic Sea blanket the region's rugged terrain as often as not, the story noted. Bursts of rain, lightning, hail, and shifting winds contribute to "a very tough weather environment," according to a quote from Brigadier General Fred Lewis, the Air Force weather director in Washington.
Day-to-day operations of a sustained air war develop into conditions unfamiliar to most Air Force weathermen. "It's certainly the most intense operations I've seen in 12 years of Air Force experience," said Captain John Bertha, the weather flight commander at Aviano Air Base in Italy, according to the report.
Among the more unfamiliar experiences occurred during the rescue of the F117 pilot who was forced to eject on a mission near Belgrade on 27 March. With the pilot down in enemy territory, elite rescue forces at Tuzla Air Base, Bosnia, scrambled special operations aircraft into the night and raced toward a rendezvous with the stranded officer, the story noted. Since Serbian troops were closing in on the downed airman, the rescue units flew into enemy airspace. The aircrews received minute by minute updates of atmospheric conditions. Flying in low and fast to avoid detection, the rescuers relied on the forecasters to shepherd them through the fog of war, cloud cover, and other potential dangers, the story reported. "There was an extremely intense focus on exact conditions almost mile by mile," Bertha explained.
Using a mix of historical weather data, weather balloons, computer modeling, satellites, a layered forecast system, professional intuition, and high-speed communications, the Air Force meteorologists provide mission planners and operators with precise, up-to-the-minute reports.
"In the past," General Lewis is quoted as saying, "we've kind of coped with the weather and tried to avoid the weather. What we're trying to do is move to an environment where we can anticipate and exploit the weather to our advantage." Forecasters look ahead 10 days or more to provide long-range projections to NATO leaders, the story read. They furnish mission planning cells with 24- to 72-hour forecasts. Then, they brief pilots one hour before takeoff and monitor weather conditions until they return.
The forecasts determine mission tactics, including when to launch sorties, optimal flight altitudes, and routes to targets. Head winds increase fuel consumption and flight times, lightning limits the opportunity for inflight refueling, while turbulence and ice buildup on aircraft can compromise missions, the story noted.
The creation of detailed forecasts requires input of numerous organizations. In Operation Allied Force, for instance, the story reported, global weather predictions produced by the Air Force Weather Agency are fine-tuned by an operational weather squadron at Simbac Air Base, Germany. Meteorologists at Aviano factor in local conditions and tweak the regional forecast.
During the first weeks of the bombing campaign, the story noted, virtually everyone talked about the weather, but only Air Force meteorologists working 12-hour shifts predicted it with a stunning 90% accuracy, according to Bertha. "That's phenomenal—beyond belief," he said. "We are on the leading edge of meteorology."
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Carbon dioxide emissions over the next century could increase wintertime precipitation over the U.S. Southwest and Great Plains by 40% as global average temperature rises 3°F (2°C), according to the latest results from a new climate system model developed at the National Center for Atmospheric Research by NCAR, university, and other laboratory scientists. Reducing the buildup of carbon dioxide concentrations over the next century by one half largely dries up the extra rain and snow and slows the global temperature rise to 2°F (1.5°C). The model results were announced in April in Atlanta. The study was funded in part by the National Science Foundation (NSF), NCAR's primary sponsor.
The NCAR model simulated the earth's climate from 1870 to 1990 and then continued the simulation to 2100 under two different scenarios. The first was a "business-as-usual" increase in greenhouse gases in which atmospheric carbon dioxide doubles over the next century. In the second, carbon dioxide increases are stabilized at 50% above today's concentrations. In the first projection, changes in precipitation vary markedly by region and by season. Within the United States, the greatest increases occur in the southwest and Great Plains in winter and substantially exceed the range of natural variability. Precipitation changes are reduced when carbon dioxide emissions are limited, according to the model.
Global average temperature climbs by 3°F (2°C) for business-as-usual and 2°F (1.5°C) when carbon dioxide emissions are limited. These changes are three to four times larger than the warming that has occurred since 1900. On the continental scale, carbon dioxide stabilization reduces climate warming over Eurasia more than over North America.
NCAR scientist Tom Wigley says, "These results show that we will experience not only future climate change, but also the results of policies to reduce these changes, in ways that are not simply related to changes in the global mean temperature. Policy decisions about reducing greenhouse emissions should not, therefore, be dictated by projected changes in global mean temperature alone."
The model shows no clear separation between the business-as-usual and the stabilization cases until around 2060, even though the carbon dioxide concentrations begin to diverge in 2010. The half-century lag until the changes in greenhouse emissions begin to affect the climate noticeably is the result of large thermal inertia in the earth's climate system, especially in the oceans, say the scientists.
The NCAR model's special features help push the science of climate modeling into new territory. It is one of the world's first global models not to require special corrections to keep the simulated climate from drifting to an unrealistic state. It is also one of only a handful of models in the world capable of realistically simulating the chemistry and transport of individual greenhouse gases and sulfur compounds. The model employs a more realistic scenario for future emissions of sulfur dioxide, a form of industrial pollution that cools the climate. Assuming that societies will take steps to reduce sulfur dioxide emissions over the next century, the scientists incorporated this decline into the model. The sulfur dioxide cooling effect gradually diminishes, allowing the simultaneous greenhouse warming to emerge more clearly.
Data from these NCAR climate system model runs are available to the scientific community for research into possible effects of climate change on human health, water resources, agriculture, natural ecosystems, and the economy. Scientists from both NCAR and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration worked on the study, which was funded by NSF and ACACIA (A Consortium for the Application of Climate Impact Assessments). ACACIA is a joint NCAR-industry program sponsored by electric utility research organizations in the United States, Japan, and the Netherlands, and by NCAR and NSF. The simulations were run on supercomputers at NCAR and in Japan.
For more information, see Tom Wigley's background paper on the World Wide Web at http://www.cgd.ucar.edu/cas/ACACIA/index.html. For model data, see the U.S. National Assessment site at http://www.usgcrp.gov.
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Mobile Doppler radar instruments funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and deployed by scientists Howard Bluestein and Joshua Wurman of the University of Oklahoma and Andrew Pazmany of the University of Massachusetts are edging ever closer to the funnel clouds of tornadoes— including this month's devastating storms in Oklahoma. One of these storms passed within a half mile of the mobile units.
NSF supports the two complementary projects with the goal of understanding how tornadoes form and "decay," and the damage that might be expected from them. The first project supports the "Doppler on Wheels," which has been jointly developed by the University of Oklahoma and the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado. These mobile radars, one painted pink and yellow, the other blue and green, are mounted on two flat-bed trucks. Sporting the radar instruments, the trucks become odd-looking configurations of generators, equipment, and operator cabins. According to Wurman, who directs this project, these radars are ideally suited to provide detailed information on the three-dimensional wind and precipitation distribution in the near vicinity of the tornado vortex. The "Doppler on Wheels" team collected extensive data on the genesis of the tornado that struck Moore, Oklahoma.
For many years, meteorologists have used Doppler radar at fixed locations to monitor weather patterns, as seen in weather forecasts on television. Due to advances in technology, Doppler radar has evolved to the point where it can be mounted to mobile platforms.
"The biggest advantage of the mobile Doppler radars is that scientists can collect more data with better precision," says Steve Nelson, program manager in NSF's atmospheric sciences division, which funds the mobile Doppler research. "Storms like tornadoes and hurricanes rarely move in the path of ideally spaced Doppler systems. Since we can't move the storm, it's pretty convenient that we can move the radars."
The second radar system is managed by Bluestein and Pazmany and transmits at a higher radio frequency. In practical terms, this means that while this radar cannot cover as much area as the Doppler on Wheels, it does provide finer details of the tornado. In the storms that struck Oklahoma City, Bluestein and Pazmany estimate that the radar resolution ranged between 6 and 15 meters. Due to the close proximity of the radar to the vortex, unprecedented data was collected at the contact point of the vortex with the ground. The airflow in this lowest level is believed by scientists to hold the key to many questions on tornado structure and life cycle.
"On Monday, May 3rd," Bluestein relates, "which was my first day out with the new system, we collected data from a tornado a little more than an hour before it moved through Oklahoma City wreaking devastation." The monster storm tracked by the scientists exhibited what is called "multivortex structure," several funnels, which within minutes turned into a large single tornado. "Luckily," says a relieved Bluestein, "when we were probing this storm, it was out over open country. It did, however, remove a house from its foundation a little under a mile away."
Bluestein, Pazmany, and Wurman hope to compare data from their efforts with those of other colleagues also tracking the storms. Notes Bluestein, "We should soon have a much better picture of the inner workings of a tornado."
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The National Severe Storms Laboratory has formed a partnership with the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) and the National Weather Service (NWS) to improve severe weather warnings for residents of Georgia.
NOAA's National Severe Storms Laboratory (NSSL) was recently awarded a grant from GTRI, working under contract to the Georgia Emergency Management Agency (GEMA) and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, to deploy their prototype Warning Decision Support System (WDSS) in the NWS forecast office in Peachtree City, Georgia and in GTRI's laboratories. The WDSS will enhance the capability of the NWS to warn of severe and hazardous weather and to respond to weather related emergencies, according to DeWayne Mitchell, a meteorology researcher with NSSL located in Norman, Oklahoma.
WDSS provides a set of tools that help forecasters make more efficient, effective, and timely decisions on whether to warn the public of tornadoes, severe thunderstorms, and flash floods. It includes advanced image processing, artificial intelligence, neural network, and other algorithms that utilize Doppler radar data, which is integrated with other weather sensor data to provide guidance to forecasters. Another important component of the system is the display and how the data and information are presented to the forecasters.
Typically, these NSSL-developed warning decision support tools and display concepts are tested, evaluated, and enhanced based on user feedback from forecasters in a number of NWS forecast offices across the country. When concepts are validated, they are transferred to various NWS operational systems. The algorithms and display concepts in the prototype WDSS being installed in Georgia are three to ten years ahead of what is in the present NWS operational systems.
A unique feature of the WDSS-II is its multiple Doppler radar capabilities. The system ingests data from Doppler radars in several locations and integrates it with satellite and other weather sensor data to provide warning guidance information to forecasters for their entire area of warning responsibility.
The first phase of the project began 14 April with the installation of the WDSS in the NWS Peachtree forecast office. Connections to two more WSR-88D (Doppler radar) sites in Hytop, Alabama, and Greer, South Carolina, will also be completed. The project's second phase will include the installation of an early prototype of the next generation of the system, WDSS-II (Integrated Information), in the forecast office and at the GTRI research facilities in Cobb County by 30 June.
This project will allow NSSL to work with GTRI and the National Weather Service to continue to enhance the prototype WDSS-II and to tune the algorithms and displays to the Georgia environment and to the needs of the Georgia NWS forecast offices, allowing Georgia emergency managers and other Georgia organizations to be provided with important information necessary for rapid response to weather emergencies.
"The goal of this project is to begin a long-term collaboration between NSSL and GTRI that benefits the citizens of Georgia, based on the Peachtree City NWSFO having access to the state of the art warning decision tools before they become available in AWIPS or WSR-88D," Mitchell said. "Eventually, this collaborative effort will enhance warnings not only for Georgia but for the entire nation." The project was initiated by a Governor's Task Force that examined the state's weather warning system after a tornado struck Georgia's Hall and White counties in 1998.
"Members of the task force realized they could enhance the state's warning system by utilizing the WDSS-II system," Mitchell said. "Also, they realized the computing expertise of the Georgia Tech Research Institute combined with NSSL's meteorological expertise could further improve the system."
The WDSS was utilized extensively during the 1996 Olympics at the Olympic Weather Support Office in Peachtree City, Georgia, and was rated the most useful tool for short-term predictions and warnings issued by forecasters.
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The atmosphere and the oceans usually carry on a natural exchange of carbon dioxide (CO2), a major greenhouse gas. However, during an El Niño event, the oceans, especially in the equatorial Pacific, hold more of the CO2 than normal, according to a study conducted by NOAA's Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research.
The NOAA scientists and their colleagues have determined that El Niños are a major cause of year to year changes in the net exchange of CO2 between the oceans and the atmosphere. The study is one of the first that unequivocally ties changes in ocean carbon dioxide exchange to changes in the earth's climate events. Drs. Richard A. Feely, Rik Wanninkhof, and Pieter Tans, all at NOAA, and Dr. Taro Takahashi at Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, conducted the study that provides a clearer picture of the importance of El Niño events on the earth's carbon cycle.
Writing in the 15 April issue of Nature, Feely and his colleagues suggest that the findings, based on direct measurements in the equatorial Pacific from 1992–96, indicate that during the strong El Niño events, the release rate of CO2 from the ocean to the atmosphere was reduced to 30%–80% of that of normal non-El Niño periods. This decline in carbon dioxide release from the sea to the air is large enough to be seen as a CO2 anomaly in the atmosphere. "Since CO2 is one of the primary greenhouse gases, scientists are interested in determining what are the causes of its variability in nature," said Feely. "The implication of this study is that El Niño-induced decreases in oceanic upwelling are a major cause of the interannual variability of the air–sea exchange of CO2."
The equatorial oceans are the dominant oceanic source of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, annually amounting to a net sea–air exchange of 0.7–1.5 Pg (1015) of carbon as CO2. One Pg (petagram) of carbon equals one billion metric tons of carbon. One metric ton is about 2205 pounds, or the weight of a small car. The equatorial Pacific is characterized by high seawater carbon dioxide and nutrient concentrations provided by upwelling, or the bringing up, of CO2-rich water to the surface. As a result, the region is a major site for release of carbon dioxide from the ocean interior to the atmosphere.
From studies conducted in the central and eastern equatorial Pacific, the scientists observed as much as a four-fold reduction in the carbon dioxide exchange from the ocean to the atmosphere caused by the decline of upwelling during the 1991–94 El Niño event. The decline in the upwelling is caused by a relaxation of the normal easterly winds. The total reduction of the sea–air carbon dioxide exchange during the 1991–94 El Niño is estimated to be 0.8–1.2 PgC, which is equivalent to 16%–36% of the decline of the growth rate of CO2 in the atmosphere observed over the same period. During decades dominated by strong El Niño events, such as the present one, more carbon dioxide is retained by the oceans compared with normal decades. Thus, changes in the frequency of El Niño events may have a profound impact on the sea–air exchange of carbon dioxide.
Dr. Feely is an oceanographer at NOAA's Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory in Seattle, Washington. Dr. Wanninkhof is an oceanographer at NOAA's Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory in Miami, Florida. Dr. Tans is an atmospheric chemist at NOAA's Climate Monitoring and Diagnostic Laboratory in Boulder, Colorado. Dr. Takahashi is an oceanographer at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory in Palisades, New York
For more information about El Niño, visit http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/toga-tao/el-nino and for more information about the role of oceans in the carbon cycle, visit http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/co2/co2-home.html.
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The National Science Foundation (NSF) announced a three-year, $1.6-million grant to the Science & Technology Interactive Center (SciTech) in Aurora, Illinois, to disseminate a traveling exhibition, "Midwestern Wild Weather." The project is intended to reach audiences in small and rural communities and the science centers and museums in the states of Illinois, Iowa, Indiana, and Michigan.
This project will replicate five of a set of nine interactive exhibits on the topic of destructive weather that is prevalent in the Midwest. This exhibition is being produced in collaboration with SPARC (Springfield, Peoria, Aurora, Rockford, and Carbondale, Illinois) and represents a strong model for collaboration among museums, science centers, and the formal educational system. The SPARC Collaboration developed this program of traveling exhibits, demonstrations, and teacher materials under a major grant from the Illinois State Board of Education, Center on Science Literacy.
Founding Director of SciTech Ernest Malamud said, "Weather is a topic that affects and interests everyone, and through it we can teach principles of science and mathematics. Students will calculate dewpoint and learn how Doppler Radar is used to track a tornado. They will learn about the water cycle, air pressure, and how snow fences work. The 'Thunder and Lightning' exhibit dramatically demonstrates the difference between the speed of light and the speed of sound and how electric charge builds up in a cloud. Students will begin to realize how much science is in things around them."
An innovative feature of this project design is the use of "attractor" exhibits to entice persons to come to the museum or science center. The project also delivers a set of exhibits to a school to set up a "Museum in a School" for one week, reaching fourth- through eighth-grade students. This collaboration of nine museums expects to serve over 79 000 children and 2640 teachers. The teachers whose classes use the exhibits will receive additional training and hands-on activities for the classroom.
"This unique effort promises to effectively educate the rural Midwest public about the fundamental science underlying wild weather and disseminate to them practical information and facts of wild weather," said James Oglesby, program director for science literacy and informal science education at NSF...This project has the potential to fill the real need of making available quality exhibits to small museums and bringing informal education resources to small/rural communities," said project director Olivia Diaz at the Science & Technology Interactive Center.
The grant was awarded by NSF's Informal Science Education program and continues through early 2002.
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Scientists from the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) spent April at the Northeast's highest, coldest, and windiest peak, studying dangerous aircraft icing. The Mount Washington Winter Icing and Storms Project (MWISP) is testing methods for remote sensing and improved prediction of in-flight icing conditions, particularly freezing drizzle and freezing rain, which can down small aircraft.
New Hampshire's Mount Washington, best known for its high winds, has a summit enclosed in cloud 61% of the time during an average April. "It's a wonderful late-winter, early-spring cloud lab," says NCAR's Marcia Politovich, who is leading the field observations along with Chuck Ryerson (the U.S. Army Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory, or CRREL) and Ken Rancourt (Mount Washington Observatory, or MWO). In mid-April, the peak saw prolonged snow, cold, and winds gusting above 100 miles per hour. "The fast-moving clouds provide constantly changing conditions that are a challenge for the radars to track," says Politovich. MWISP is the largest field program conducted on the summit, where some of the first research on icing began in the 1930s.
The goal of MWISP is to improve in-flight icing detection, mainly from remote sensors, and to improve forecasts issued by computer models. Pilot reports can be used for long-term, large-scale comparisons with a model. However, "To get down to smaller scales, like the terminal area around airports, we need measurements with more detail than just the pilots' 'yes' or 'no' for icing," says Politovich. Better icing-prediction software is expected to become part of the Weather Research and Forecast model being created by NCAR, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and the University of Oklahoma.
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Glenn Research Center is flying its Twin Otter aircraft through clouds above the mountain's summit. NCAR is joining NOAA, CRREL, and Quadrant Engineering to analyze data from remote sensors and compare the results with on-site measurements from the summit and aircraft. The remote sensors include a five-channel, fully polarimetric radiometer at the summit that will sense radiation emitted by clouds. Deployed a few miles west of the peak, near Bretton Woods, are X-, K-, and W-band radars, a lidar (laser-emitting radar), and a second multichannel radiometer. Balloon-borne weather instruments are being launched from various points by a mobile unit from NCAR, and Plymouth State and Lyndon State colleges are providing weather forecasts. The researchers are developing techniques that use combinations of remote sensors to analyze supercooled droplets and ice crystals. These droplets remain liquid, even with air temperatures below freezing, until they encounter a surface on which to freeze (such as an airplane's wing).
The aviation community is watching as MWISP examines freezing drizzle and freezing rain. According to NCAR's Ben Bernstein, "Much of the research and development of operational forecast tools on supercooled drops has focused on freezing drizzle and ignored freezing rain." Bernstein has analyzed a case from February 1998 in which the same NASA Twin Otter aircraft now flying in MWISP suffered over 90 minutes of exposure to freezing rain above the Midwest. The result was a major degradation of the plane's performance, including an increase in drag of up to 200%.
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At a press conference in Washington, D.C., the National Ocean Research Leadership Council (NORLC) announced that it has released a report to Congress calling for an integrated-ocean observing system that would routinely gather ocean information similar to the information gathered for atmospheric weather forecasting. The Council is composed of officials from 12 federal ocean agencies, including NOAA.
An integrated-ocean observing system would move ocean observations from a research-focused activity toward an operational system. The report, "Toward a U.S. Plan for an Integrated, Sustained Ocean Observing System," calls for sustaining existing ocean observations, integrating new and existing observations, and adapting this system to meet evolving needs. It also calls for funding of these activities, organizing and managing them, and building private/public sector partnerships. The report addresses major national needs, such as detecting and forecasting the ocean's role in climate, facilitating safe and efficient marine operations, ensuring healthy and restored degraded marine ecosystems, mitigating natural hazards, and ensuring public health.
"We currently have a sustained operational atmospheric observing system that has enabled us to dramatically improve atmospheric weather forecasts. We have invested in operational ocean observing systems in the Pacific that have enabled us to provide successful El Niño-based seasonal atmospheric forecasts. This report calls on us to take the next step and expand the operational systems to the global ocean," said D. James Baker, Commerce undersecretary for oceans and atmosphere.
A robust ocean observation system is vital to the success of naval operations and fundamental to our national security," said Rear Admiral Paul G. Gaffney II, chief of Naval Research. "We have some of the most comprehensive ocean and atmospheric data sets in the world today; however, we continue to need even more sophisticated and timely ocean data to ensure safe operations and to optimize performance."
"Today we're releasing a letter, signed by almost 1800 individuals from a diverse and expansive ocean community, to the Congress and administration. The letter demonstrates that the oceanographic community is committed to working with the Congress and administration to implement an integrated-ocean observing system and to advance our understanding of our greatest natural resource: the oceans," said James D. Watkins, Admiral of the U.S. Navy (retired) and president of CORE.
CORE is the D.C.-based organization that represents 59 academic institutions, aquaria, nonprofit research institutes and federal research laboratories in the common goal of promoting the visibility and effectiveness of U.S. ocean research and education. Congressmen Jim Saxton (R-PA) and Weldon (R-NJ) also announced they will hold hearings on this ocean observing system proposal this summer.
"I am pleased to see the release today of a plan for an integrated-ocean observing system. Such a system would lead to a vastly improved understanding of the earth's climate and ocean systems. This plan was prepared after the Subcommittee on Fisheries Conservation, Wildlife, and Oceans held a hearing on the current state of U.S. ocean observations last summer," said Congressman Jim Saxton. " One of the premier sites for designing and testing the equipment that will form the basis for large scale ocean observation systems is LEO-15 [Long-term Ecological Observatory at 15 meters]. LEO-15 lies off the coast of the congressional district that I represent, and I have long supported the work that is done there. Now I look forward to supporting a larger more comprehensive effort to observe and understand the complex environment of the ocean."
The report is in response to a request from Congressmen Weldon and Saxton, who in August 1998 sent a letter to Undersecretary Baker and Navy Secretary John Dalton requesting that the NORLC "propose a plan to achieve a truly integrated-ocean observing system."
The NORLC consists of the heads of 12 federal agencies that are involved in funding ocean research policy. The agencies include: U.S. Navy, NOAA, Environmental Protection Agency, National Science Foundation, Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, National Aeronautics and Space Administration, U.S. Geological Survey, Minerals Management Service, Office of Science and Technology Policy, Office of Management and Budget, U.S. Coast Guard, and Department of Energy.
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Reduction in the atmosphere of a single chemical, methyl chloroform, is primarily responsible for the overall decline of ozone-depleting substances observed in the atmosphere during the past five years. Because methyl chloroform will soon become a much smaller part of the remaining ozone-depleting substances due to its rapid natural disintegration, further reductions in the threat to the ozone layer would have to come from reductions in other ozone-depleting gases, say researchers at the Commerce Department's National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
In a paper appearing in the April issue of Nature, scientists at NOAA's Climate Monitoring and Diagnostics Laboratory in Boulder, Colorado, say that ozone-depleting chemicals have declined about 3% overall since 1994, mainly due to the loss of methyl chloroform from the atmosphere. Methyl chloroform, a chemical previously used as a cleaning solvent, is destroyed much more rapidly in the atmosphere by natural processes than other ozone-depleting substances. Lead author Stephen A. Montzka says that "based on our understanding of atmospheric removal processes, the level of methyl chloroform will diminish to such an extent over the next 5–10 years that it will no longer influence the overall amount of ozone-depleting substances in the atmosphere."
Restrictions on the production of ozone-depleting chemicals are outlined in the Montreal Protocol, an international agreement that limits the production of ozone-damaging chemicals. These restrictions are designed to ensure that the threat posed by ozone-depleting substances diminishes over the next 50 years and will allow a return to "pre-ozone hole" levels sometime in the middle of the next century.
While the concentrations of some ozone-depleting substances (CFC-11, CFC-113, CCL4) are decreasing slightly in response to the Montreal Protocol, the authors say that the global amount of a few chemicals continues to increase in the atmosphere despite international regulation. Levels of the most abundant and persistent CFC (CFC-12), a bromine compound (halon-1211), and the chemicals used as replacements for CFCs (the hydrochlorofluorocarbons or HCFCs) continue to increase in the atmosphere.
Despite the very low concentrations of halon-1211, the researchers have determined that continued increases of this gas are slowing the collective decline of ozone-depleting chemicals in the atmosphere more than any other persistent man-made gas. Halons have a significant influence on stratospheric ozone because they contain bromine, which is about 50 times more efficient at destroying ozone than the chlorine released by CFCs. Considering this enhanced efficiency, all halons account for about 10%–15% of the ozone-depleting potential of today's atmosphere.
To discover the root causes of these trends, the authors computed emissions of ozone-depleting substances based on observations from NOAA's network of air-sampling sites around the globe. The results suggest that during the past 10 years, emissions of most chemicals have diminished substantially as a result of the Montreal Protocol. Emissions of the two most common CFCs, CFC-11, and CFC-12, have diminished to between one-half and one-third of the amount released during the late 1980s, which were the peak years. Despite these reductions, concentration increases continue for CFC-12 because it is extremely persistent in the atmosphere.
"Emissions of halon-1211 have not decreased despite the ban on production in developed countries since 1994," Montzka says. Some of the continued release of this chemical results because a substantial reservoir or "bank" exists in fire extinguishers that are still in use today in many developed countries. Production figures from the United Nations Environment Programme suggest that accelerated production of this halon in developing countries also accounts for a large portion of the continued increase.
Hydrochlorofluorocarbons (HCFCs) are also increasing because they are used as interim replacements for ozone-depleting substances. But, the authors say, these chemicals are less efficient at destroying stratospheric ozone than CFC-12 and the halons, and at present, only account for about 2% of the ozone-depleting substances in the atmosphere.
"Progress towards reducing the threat to stratospheric ozone posed by CFCs and related gases is evident in measurements of air throughout the globe, and continuation of this trend would ensure the eventual recovery of the ozone layer," Montzka says. "However, a sustained reduction of ozone-depleting agents will be realized only if use and release of these substances continues to decline in future years."
According to David Hofmann, director of NOAA's Climate Monitoring and Diagnostics Laboratory, "continued monitoring of atmospheric levels of ozone-depleting gases will be necessary to assess our progress towards recovery of the ozone layer as mandated by the Protocol."
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The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and schools across the country are teaming up to teach elementary school children and their care givers how to protect themselves from overexposure to the sun through a new educational program called SunWise. More than 50 schools began participating in the pilot program this May. A second pilot phase is scheduled for next school year, with plans to expand nationwide by the 2000–2001 school year.
The EPA SunWise School Program is designed to teach elementary school students, their teachers, parents, and others in communities across the country about the health risks association with ultraviolet (UV) radiation. Through SunWise, students and teachers will increase their awareness of simple steps they can take to protect themselves from overexposure to the sun.
"Children spend lots of time outdoors during recess, physical education, classes, after-school activities, and sports programs," said Kevin Rosseel, with the agency's Stratospheric Protection Division. "We believe schools and teachers can play a major role in protecting children against the harmful effects of overexposure to the sun by teaching sun safety behaviors. That's what SunWise is all about."
According to the EPA, overexposure to UV radiation can cause serious health effects, including skin cancer and other skin disorders, eye damage and cataracts, and immune system suppression. The EPA also notes that one in five Americans developing skin cancer during their lifetime and 58% of blindness worldwide is caused by cataracts. Children are particularly at risk since most of the average person's lifetime sun exposure occurs before the age of 18.
By signing up as a SunWise partner, schools agree to sponsor activities that raise children's awareness of the largely preventable health risks from UV radiation and teach simple steps to avoid overexposure. Such activities may include: reporting the UV Index daily on this Web site; educating children about stratospheric ozone, ozone depletion, and UV radiation; sponsoring 'Safe Fun in the Sun' days; providing shade cover in outdoor areas; and inviting health professionals, environmentalists, and meteorologists to speak with school children.
In addition, students in the program will be able to plug daily UV Index forecast information into a new "Learning Web site" and eventually will be able to use the Web site for sharing information with other school children across the country. The EPA is also providing free of charge hand-held UV radiation meters so that children can compare the UV Index forecasts with actual measurements.
Participating schools will also receive a variety of interactive program materials to help them implement these and other activities including informational brochures, cross-curricular classroom lessons, resource lists for teachers, and more.
Additional information on the EPA SunWise School Program is available on the Internet at http://www.epa.gov/Sunwise
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From the vantage point of the earth, it's easy for the human eye to distinguish snow and ice from clouds and fog. But to the eye of a weather satellite 500 miles above the earth, it's quite a challenge. Scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have developed a new method to distinguish snow and ice from clouds and fog in satellite imagery. It will mean more accurate weather observations, forecasts, and climate data.
"NOAA's newest polar-orbiting satellite, NOAA-15, has a new channel that its predecessors did not," explained Rob Fennimore of NOAA's National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service. "The 1.6-micron channel on an instrument called the Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer permits improved snow, ice, and cloud discrimination. We've been testing the new channel since 10 March."
Fennimore, George Stephens, and their colleagues have developed an image-processing technique that uses the new 1.6-micron channel, the 0.63- micron visible channel, and the 11.0-micron thermal channel to differentiate snow and ice from clouds and fog. The process renders the snow and ice white and most other surface features in natural colors. Low clouds are yellow; higher clouds range from yellow through green to light blue as the cloud temperature decreases.
The new methods have resulted in the production of some dynamic satellite images of the Great Lakes, Rockies, the Gulf of Saint Lawrence, Western Canada, and the Bering Sea. "These cover the gamut of scene types," Fennimore said. "With the five images, we have spanned the test period for the 1.6- micron channel quite nicely."
All scenes contain snow. The Great Lakes image contains lakes, farm/grassland, and forest. The Rocky Mountains image contains mountains, forest, and farm/grassland. The Gulf of St. Lawrence image shows forest, and sea/ice. The image of Western Canada shows mountains, forest, and tundra. And the image of the Bering Sea shows sea-ice and tundra.
The images can be viewed at: http://www.osei.noaa.gov/Events/Snow/NOAA15new/
Testing of the new channel ended 20 April, and routine operational use of its snow detection capabilities will begin next winter when a new satellite exactly like NOAA-15 is scheduled for launch. The imagery will be used to generate snowcover maps for the National Weather Service's forecasting applications. The imagery will also be used to create special images covering significant snow and ice events.
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The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration now has access to satellite imagery that helps NOAA scientists monitor tropical cyclones over the Indian Ocean, dust storms over Africa, the onset of the summer monsoon over India, and other severe weather events, the Commerce Department agency announced.
The near real-time imagery is from Meteosat-5, a backup geostationary satellite operated by the European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT). The imagery, covering the Indian Ocean, Africa, and Asia, is available through an existing agreement between NOAA and EUMETSAT.
Meteosat-5 is in geostationary orbit 22 320 miles above the earth at 63° E longitude. It was moved from a standby orbit to its current station last May to support the multination Indian Ocean Experiment INDOEX, which addresses questions of climate change that are of great value to the United States and the international community.
Meteosat-5 images are acquired by a EUMETSAT ground station at Lannion, France, operated by France's national weather service, Météo-France. The images are sent automatically via dedicated frame relay circuit to NOAA's National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service (NESDIS) in Suitland, Maryland, for delivery to the satellite analysis branch. There, scientists use the data along with other global sources of environmental satellite information to determine the location and intensity of tropical storms, support the identification and monitoring of volcanic eruptions, and for routine snowcover analyses for the climatology community and National Weather Service numerical models.
EUMETSAT has committed to supporting Meteosat-5 imagery from 63/E until the end of 1999. The possible continuation beyond this date is dependent upon an analysis of whether the fuel supply is sufficient to enable the satellite to maintain station with the necessary precision.
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The launch of an advanced U.S. weather satellite that will monitor hurricanes, severe thunderstorms, flash floods, and other severe weather, originally planned for launch 15 May from Cape Canaveral Air Station, has been delayed to allow Lockheed Martin to review several recent launch failures. The new launch date has been set for 27 May. The Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite is currently being processed for launch at a facility near Cape Canaveral. Now called GOES-L, the satellite will be renamed NOAA GOES-11 once reaching geostationary orbit.
"GOES satellites are a mainstay of weather forecasting in the United States," said Gerry Dittberner, NOAA's GOES program manager. "They are the backbone of short-term forecasting, or nowcasting. GOES images of clouds are well-known to all Americans; the images can be seen on television weather forecasts every day."
The real-time weather data gathered by GOES satellites, combined with data from Doppler radars and automated surface observing systems, greatly aids weather forecasters in providing better warnings of severe weather. These warnings help to save lives, preserve property, and benefit commercial interests. For example, in 1998, NOAA's National Weather Service had an average lead time of 10.7 minutes for tornado warnings and an average lead time of 50.6 minutes for flash floods.
"GOES satellites help our forecasters to see both the big picture and small-scale storm features," said Jack Kelly, director of the National Weather Service. "Since they are designed to be stationary, GOES satellites act as steady eyes on the ever-changing weather and climate."
The United States operates two meteorological satellites in geostationary orbit 22 300 miles over the equator, one over the East Coast and one over the West Coast. NOAA GOES-10, launched on 25 April 1997, is currently overlooking the West Coast out into the Pacific including Hawaii; it is located at 135° W longitude. NOAA GOES-8, launched in April 1994, is overlooking the East Coast out into the Atlantic Ocean and is positioned at 75° W.
NOAA GOES-L will be stored on orbit ready for operation when needed as a replacement for GOES-8 or -10. "NOAA GOES-L will ensure continuity of GOES data from two GOES, especially for the Atlantic hurricane season," Dittberner said.
NOAA's National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service operates the GOES series of satellites. After the satellites complete on-orbit checkout by NASA, NOAA assumes responsibility for command and control, data receipt, and product generation and distribution. The GOES satellites are a critical component of the ongoing National Weather Service modernization program, aiding forecasters in providing more precise and timely forecasts.
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Russia and Japan are developing satellites that would provide early warning of earthquakes and solar flares. If plans for the projects materialize, the Russian satellite for detecting earthquakes could be launched by 2001 and the Japanese satellite could be launched as early as 2005.
The 120-kg Russian satellite, called Predvestnik E, would be the first of a constellation of spacecraft capable of providing global early warning of major earthquake activity. Designed to detect changes in the ionosphere that occur prior to major earthquakes, the satellite would orbit the earth at an altitude of 450 km at an inclination of 65°. Project officials hope to forecast earthquakes between two days and two hours in advance.
As currently designed, the spacecraft would carry an FM-4 stationary field magnetometer for measuring the components of magnetic fields; a hydroxyl spectrometer to measure the distribution and intensity of hydroxyl and atomic oxygen emissions; an infrared spectrometer to measure electric field density; a high-energy particle monitor, and a video-photo metric system to measure intensity and frequency of light discharge and atmospheric glow.
That equipment will monitor processes that occur in the earth's crust prior to earthquakes, scientists said. Those processes change the chemical composition of underground water and atmospheric gases at the epicenter of the developing quake, they explained. The equipment also measures increases in the emission of radioactive substances into the atmosphere, such as radon gas and charged aerosols. These processes cause temperature fluctuations in the area above the coming quake and alters electric parameters of the earth's ionosphere.
A pending earthquake results in changes in all major atmospheric characteristics, including electric field intensity, plasma transfer rate, concentration of electrons, plasma ionic composition, and longitudinal currents and wave disturbance in various frequency bands, according to the scientists.
As for the Japanese, that nation's Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications (MPT) hopes to launch a spacecraft in six years that will give satellite operators advance warning of solar flares. MPT has allocated 370 million yen ($3.14 million) in research funding for the project. Although still in the conceptual stage, MPT envisions a satellite weighing less than 500 kg to be placed in an observing location called Lagrange point 5 in time to catch the solar maximum in 2011. Solar activity is now rising toward the next maximum in 2000–2001.
From the Lagrange point 5 position, a satellite carrying a 10-cm diameter telescope could identify dangerous solar flares on the sun's surface, warning satellite operators before the flares reach Earth. The flares can bring surges of high-energy protons and ions that can disrupt delicate semiconductors and electronics. They also eject hypersonic plasma waves, energizing the earth's protective Van Allen Radiation Belt and causing more harmful radiation. Project officials believe the satellite would allow operators to issue emergency bulletins two to four hours before potentially dangerous ejections reach spacecraft.
Project planning is expected to be completed by 2001, officials predicted. MPT then will ask for a development budget, estimated at 20 billion yen. Japan's National Space Development Agency (NASDA), which is helping with the planning, would build the satellite.
MPT has been monitoring solar weather since 1988. Solar flares created newspaper headlines in February 1994 when one temporarily knocked out the nation's BS-3a satellite's live transmission of the Winter Olympics, according to officials.
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NASA will take a revolutionary global look at clouds with a new spaceborne radar capable of peering deep into their interior to study their structure, composition, and effects on climate.
Cloudsat, which is scheduled to fly in 2003, will use an advanced radar to "slice" through clouds to see their vertical structure, providing a completely new observational capability from space; current weather satellites can only image the uppermost layers of clouds. Cloudsat will be the first satellite to study clouds on a global basis.
"A trio of satellites will provide unprecedented information on how clouds help transfer solar energy to and from our planet's atmosphere," said Dr. Ghassem Asrar, associate administrator for Earth Sciences, NASA Headquarters, Washington, D.C. "The data from Cloudsat will help us understand changes in the earth's climate on global, regional, and local scales. An important contribution of Cloudsat is the way it will fly in formation with the Earth Observing System-PM and the PICASSO-CENA satellites."
PICASSO-CENA, a cooperative mission between NASA and France, will study the role of transparent, thin clouds and aerosols, small atmospheric particles, and their effect on solar-energy transfer. The Cloud Profiling Radar of Cloudsat will study the three-dimensional structure of most clouds important to weather and climate. This capability complements an instrument aboard PICASSO-CENA, which will observe the vertical structure of thin clouds and aerosols. These two missions will provide critically needed satellite measurements that will help researchers understand how the earth's solar energy and climate interact on a global scale. Cloudsat data also will complement the Earth Observing System-PM satellite, which will collect data on the dynamics of Earth's atmosphere, and the Triana mission, both to be launched in 2000.
Dr. Graeme Stephens of Colorado State University, Fort Collins, Colorado, will be principal investigator of the Cloudsat mission. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, will manage the international mission, which will include participation from the United States, Canada, Germany, and Japan.
The estimated cost of the Cloudsat mission is $135 million. NASA's contribution will be approximately $111 million, with additional funding provided by the Canadian Space Agency, the U.S. Department of Energy, and the U.S. Air Force. The Canadian Space Agency also is developing key radar components and contributing scientific expertise. Ball Aerospace, Boulder, Colorado, will build the Cloudsat spacecraft.
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House Science Committee Chairman F. James Sensenbrenner (R-WI) has taken issue with President Clinton and NASA Administrator Dan Goldin regarding the International Space Station (ISS).
Writing in the 10 May issue of Space News, Sensenbrenner took issue specifically with Goldin's remarks as printed in Space News during the 15th annual National Space Symposium in Colorado Springs, Colorado. He noted that Goldin was quoted as having called on America "to grow up a little bit" with regard to criticism about Russia remaining in the critical path of the ISS. "So far," the committee chairman wrote, "the U.S–Russian relationship has been based on half-truths, misleading statements, and, now, apparently outright lies."
He wrote that President Clinton had assured him in a letter of 22 June 1994 that the United States "will maintain in-line autonomous U.S.flight and life support capability during all phases of station assembly...As the program continues to develop and NASA reaches subsequent implementing agreements with the Russian Space Agency...the United States will retain in-line autonomous capabilities."
"That promise was not kept," Sensenbrenner wrote, "leading one to conclude either NASA disobeyed a presidential directive or the president's promise was insincere." Sensenbrenner noted that on 13 February 1995, NASA Administrator Dan Goldin testified, "So far, the Russians have been performing, but at the direction and insistence of Mr. Sensenbrenner, we have taken some very important actions so that Russia is not on the critical path."
"We now must conclude," Sensenbrenner wrote, "these 'very important actions' were not as important as advertised or we would not find ourselves in the current quagmire—dependent on the Russians until 2002 and vulnerable to their continuing funding crisis. Internal NASA documents show Russia's involvement already has cost American taxpayers $5 billion."
The chairman noted that "it is apparent he (Goldin) has abandoned what he told Congress and the American public. In October 1993, Mr. Goldin testified before Congress, 'I would like to make it very clear that the baseline space station, the design the administration is asking Congress to fund, is the Alpha Station plan independent of Russian participation.' Now, in Space News, Mr. Goldin says 'Without the Russians, I don't know if we would be able to build an international space station.' In essence, he believes the United States has no choice but to keep an unreliable partner in the critical path of the ISS, despite his earlier assurances.
"Furthermore, the NASA administrator apparently is attempting to disguise public policy fiasco as a policy virtue." He quoted Goldin as having said, "The Russian taught us about what it's like to be in space for long periods of time (through the space shuttle and Mir program.) I have got to say it was an incredible success. It was incredible, the teamwork, the camaraderie, that went on between the Russians and the Americans."
Sensenbrenner noted "It is disturbing that Mr. Goldin is ready to pronounce the relationship an unqualified success, especially when it is responsible for creating a program years behind schedule and billions of dollars over budget. The ISS was supposed to cost $17.4 billion to develop; its first element was to be launched in November 1997; and it was supposed to be complete in June 2002.
"Last year the Cost Assessment and Validation (CAV) Task Force estimated ISS would cost $24.7 billion or more and the first element was launched a year behind schedule. NASA's own estimate for the completion date is no earlier than October 2004." In spite of his criticism, Sensenbrenner noted he continues to support the space program and ISS, as well as cooperation with the Russians "but in a manner more commensurate with their financial capabilities, perhaps in a subcontractor role."
"Defending and maintaining the fiction that Russia is capable of discharging its responsibilities gets ISS nowhere," he wrote. "I'm disappointed the NASA administrator apparently confuses genuine policy disagreements with a failure to act in a leadership capacity. It is sad his position compelled him to clarify his remarks as not meaning 'America is bad or the people involved are bad.' Perhaps he was reminding himself that policy disputes do not necessarily mean one is disloyal to American leadership in space."
Sensenbrenner began his article with "Relationships not built on truthfulness are forever doomed to immaturity, cynicism, and failure." He concluded by writing, "Admitting your mistakes and taking responsibility is part of 'growing up.' The NASA administrator should take his own advice when it comes to keeping Russia in the critical path of the ISS."
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Joanne Simpson, chief scientist for meteorology at the NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, in Greenbelt, Maryland, has been elected as an Honorary Member of the Royal Meteorological Society, one of the world's oldest meteorological societies. She was elected an Honorary Member of the American Meteorological Society in 1995, and served as president of AMS in 1989.
The Royal Meteorological Society was founded in 1850 in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, to "form a society the objects of which should be the advancement and extension of meteorological science by determining the laws of climate and of meteorological phenomenon in general." Originally called the British Meteorological Society, it be came the Royal Meteorological Society in 1883 when Her Majesty Queen Victoria granted the privilege of adding "Royal" to the title. Honorary Membership is limited to 20 Members: 10 British and 10 foreign.
Dr. Simpson has been with NASA since 1979 and has served as chief meteorologist with the Earth Sciences Directorate since 1989. She was the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission satellite project scientist from 1986 until after launch in late 1997. Prior to joining the space agency, she was the Corcoran Professor of Environmental Sciences at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. She was also the director of the Experimental Meteorological Laboratory for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and formerly taught meteorology, physics, and environmental science at UCLA and the Illinois Institute of Technology.
Simpson has received numerous awards and honors including the American Meteorological Society Meisinger Award in 1962, the AMS Rossby Research Medal in 1983 (the society's highest honor), and the C. F. Brooks Award in 1992. She was elected member of the U.S. National Academy of Engineering in 1988. A renowned scientist who pioneered computer simulation of cumulus clouds and new concepts concerning the structure and formation of tropical cyclones, she has published in hundreds of refereed literature. Simpson earned her bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degrees in meteorology at the University of Chicago.
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Paul B. MacCready, CCM, has been selected as an Aerospace Laureate for Lifetime Achievement by Aviation Week & Space Technology magazine. In making these awards, the magazine honors extraordinary achievements in aviation and aerospace. MacCready was recently elected a Councilor of the American Meteorological Society, for the term 1999–2001.
Presenting the awards at a ceremony in the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum's Hall of Fame on 21 April, Kenneth E. Gazzola, executive vice president/publisher of Aviation Week & Space Technology said, "The Laurel and Laureate winners epitomize the values and vision of the global aerospace industry, and as we approach the next century of flight, the Hall of Fame secures their place in history." Donald D. Engen, director of the Air and Space Museum added, "The 1998 Laureates have made truly significant contributions to the advancement of air and space technology. These contributions widely range from technological advancements to personal heroics. Their achievements have improved and altered the quality of our lives."
MacCready, founder/chairman of AeroVironment of Monrovia, California, was honored for his lifelong achievements in developing and promoting alternative flight. In 1956, he became the first American to win the international soaring championship (he was national champion in 1948, 1949, and 1953). Since then, he and his colleagues have made ingenious developments for, and set records for solar-powered as well as human-powered flight.
In the 1950s, MacCready developed a device to allow glider pilots to calculate optimum speed between thermals, the MacCready Speed Ring. His company, Meteorology Research, Inc., was an early business specializing in atmospheric research and weather modification. He has received numerous awards for his inventions and innovation.
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Douglas K. Lilly, distinguished senior scientist with NOAA's National Severe Storms Laboratory and emeritus professor of meteorology at the University of Oklahoma, has been elected a member of the National Academy of Sciences.
The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a private, nonprofit, self-perpetuating society of distinguished scholars engaged in scientific and engineering research, dedicated to the furtherance of science and technology and to their use for the general welfare. Upon the authority of the charter granted to it by the Congress in 1863, the academy has a mandate that requires it to advise the federal government on scientific and technical matters. Members and foreign associates are elected in recognition of their distinguished and continuing achievements in original research. Election is considered one of the highest honors that can be accorded a scientist or engineer.
"Doug Lilly is truly a national resource who has made many contributions to the fundamental understanding of small-scale atmospheric phenomena," said Jeff Kimpel, director of the National Severe Storms Laboratory. "He is an outstanding leader who has guided the careers of a large number of younger scientists. In addition, he is the intellectual leader partially responsible for the phenomenal growth and accomplishments of Oklahoma's weather center programs."
A professor of meteorology at the University of Oklahoma (OU) since 1982, Lilly held the Robert Lowry endowed chair in meteorology from 1992 until his retirement in 1995. At OU, he served as the director of the Center for Analysis and Prediction of Storms, Science, and Technology Center from 1989 to 1994 and director of the Cooperative Institute for Mesoscale Meteorological Studies from 1987 to 1991. Before joining OU, he was a senior scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, and a research meteorologist with NOAA's General Circulation Research Laboratory in Washington, D.C. Lilly's major areas of research have focused on small-scale atmospheric phenomena, including convective storms, mountain waves, turbulence, and oceanic clouds.
Born in San Francisco, he served active duty in the U.S. Navy from 1950 to 1953, earned a B.S. in physics from Stanford University in 1950, and received his M.S. and Ph.D in meteorology from The Florida State University in 1955 and 1958, respectively.
His many honors in the meteorology field include receiving the Second Half Century Award in 1973 and the Carl-Gustav Rossby Medal in 1986, both from the American Meteorological Society, and the Symons Gold Medal from the Royal Meteorological Society in 1993.
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The Senate has confirmed as director of the NOAA Corps Captain Evelyn Fields, the first woman and the first African American to serve in this position. Since her confirmation, Fields has also been promoted to the rank of rear admiral, upper half. She officially assumed her new responsibilities the week of 10 May, U.S. Secretary of Commerce William M. Daley said.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Commissioned Officers Corps is the nation's seventh uniformed service, and operates under the U.S. Department of Commerce. The Office of NOAA Corps Operations, composed of civilians and commissioned officers, operates and manages the agency's fleet of research ships and aircraft; officers also support NOAA programs through diverse shoreside positions. The NOAA Corps is the nation's smallest uniformed service. Officers, all scientists or engineers, provide NOAA with an important blend of operational, management, and technical skills that support the agency's programs at sea, in the air, and ashore. President Clinton nominated Fields for the position on 19 January. Before her confirmation, Fields served as deputy director of NOAA's National Ocean Service.
"We are extremely pleased that this exceptional, visionary officer will serve at the head of the NOAA Corps," said Secretary Daley. "Rear Admiral Fields has broken a lot of new ground throughout her career with the corps, and has a proven track record as a manager and a leader. She was the first African-American woman to be commissioned in the NOAA Corps, the first woman to command a federal ship, and the second person to be U.S. Exchange Hydrographer with Canada. Most recently, during the time she's been deputy director of the National Ocean Service, NOAA's nautical charting capabilities have taken a quantum leap forward with the development of raster and vector charts, doubling of chart production, reduction of chart update production time from 47 to just four weeks, improvement in technology with a substantial increase in data acquisition capabilities onboard NOAA hydrographic survey ships, and increase in contracting out of survey operations to the private sector."
"Rear Admiral Fields is an outstanding officer and forward-looking leader, and commands the loyalty and respect of those with whom she works. I have full confidence that under her leadership and direction, the NOAA Corps will continue to serve the agency's programs and the nation with the highest level of professionalism," said Rear Admiral William L. Stubblefield, who retired as director of the NOAA Corps on 1 March.
Fields began her career with NOAA in 1972 as a cartographer at the Atlantic Marine Center in Norfolk, Virginia, and in 1973, when NOAA began recruiting women into its commissioned service, was the first African-American woman to join the NOAA Corps. She is now the most senior woman in the corps.
During her 26 years as a NOAA Corps officer, Fields has served in a variety of staff and operational billets. She has served on the ships Mount Mitchell and Pierce as operations officer, and Rainier as executive officer, in deployments including the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, Gulf of Mexico, Caribbean, and Alaskan waters. Most notably, she was the first woman to serve as commanding officer on a NOAA ship, the McArthur, as well as the first woman to command a federal ship for an extended period within the nation's uniformed services. Her sea experience covers hydrographic survey operations, fisheries research, and oceanographic research.
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