“surfcaestations.org volunteers” should be:

http://www.surfacestation.org volunteers.

I was told by those who had been in the Joint Typhoon Warning Center in the `50′s that the cruising altitude of the commercial flights was at 500mb. Since then the cruising altitude climbed to 200mb. Since 500mb is the level of steering winds in a tropical cyclone, the lack of reports actually caused a decrease in forecast accuracy. Fortunately, satellites came to the rescue and we now have almost continuous monitoring of those systems. Even with satellites we can get surprised. I can remember the unanticipated development of Super Typhoon Tip (1979). It went over the Island of Guam still officially as a Tropical Cyclone Formation Alert Area, hitting the Island with 75mph gusts going on to become the most intense typhoon on record (190G215mph) and creating the lowest recorded sea level pressure (870 mb)

You may be right about how accurate the pireps are compared to `sonds.

I don’t know that many planes have such logs. I’m unaware of any useful log that the 777 had, other than the engine data recording it kept. While those will include temps, ambient temperature around an airliner can’t be read directly. Air compressibility and skin friction raise the raw numbers, and it has to be computed. The aircraft temperature probes are electrically de-iced, i.e., heated. The temperature is deduced by measuring the current required to keep the probe at a constant temp. All in all, I don’t think we’d get the kind of precision we get from ground stations or balloons.

Ric Werme (14:44:21) :
What I think would be neat would be for an outfit like FedEx to add dropsondes on some of their cargo planes. . . . , but I bet the operational cost would be much less so perhaps FedEx could make a profit by entering into a contract with NOAA.

Since we can’t just open a window and toss one out, dropsondes would take installing a mechanical system on the aircraft. Such a system would be expensive to buy, plus it would have to be FAA certified, which would be very costly. Once certified and installed, it would have to be maintained and inspected just like any other aircraft system. I doubt you could persuade any airline to go along.

Just an idea here… would it be possible for someone to get all the recorded temperature logs of all planes including altitude and global positioning coordinates?

What I think would be neat would be for an outfit like FedEx to add dropsondes on some of their cargo planes. Instead of being expendable, these would be gliders and have GPS-based control systems. Released near FedEx processing centers they would glide down to the roof where they would be picked up, data sent to NOAA or private wx business and then packaged up for a new flight.

I imagine the NOAA weather balloons fly quite a bit higher than aircraft, so I doubt they’d fully replace the balloons, but I bet the operational cost would be much less so perhaps FedEx could make a profit by entering into a contract with NOAA.

I haven’t found a map of the sites yet, but it would be interesting to get the records and see how they track with RSS, UAH, and Hadley.

“But meeting the Department of Energy’s goal of wind power generation by 2030 would require that scores of huge wind farms be built throughout the Midwestern United States. The total disturbance caused by turbines could be enough to steer storms.”

If they could steer storms, imagine the arguments between states that would or wouldn’t be hit depending on whether the wind farms are left on or turned off. That’s not even considering the choice between power generation vs. storm mitigation, which the researcher recognized.

Talk about unintended consequences. Could the wind farms be held liable for massive infrastructural damage caused by storms? =)

Mac Crenshaw Memorial Airport
Greenville, Alabama, USA
This otherwise excellent looking and well-sited ASOS station sports the twin prop wreckage from an aborted takeoff. Pilot/passenger suffered injuries but escaped with their lives.

The photo gives a less biased (less artistic, more scientific) view of the distance between fence and wreckage.

REPLY: Hmmm..guess I had better look at my own database more closely. I missed that. Good catch – Anthony

Bill Derryberry