The Cold Air Aloft Problem: Applications of Temperature Soundings in High Latitude Regions for Aviation

SUMMARY • A collaborative effort between SPoRT, CIMSS, CIRA, GINA, and NOAA has produced a unique visualization of gridded NUCAPS output in AWIPS II to aid aviation forecasters in Alaska with the detection of the 3D extent of cold air aloft that can be hazardous to aircraft Fig. 2. Sample MIS product issued by CWSU defining the 3D extent of potentially hazardous cold air.Fig. 1. Anchorage, AK CWSU domain http://cwsu.arh.noaa.gov/ Fig. 4. 200 hPa NUCAPS MW+IR soundings (left) and ECMWF 200 hPa reanalysis at 1200 UTC on 9 January 2015 during a CAA outbreak across eastern Alaska and western Canada. The “X” denotes the location of the sounding shown in Fig. 5. X Fig. 5. Comparison of observed and modeled vertical soundings over western Canada in core of CAA (“X” in Fig. 4) at 1200 UTC on 9 January 2015. Note that coldest air in CrIS data is lower in the atmosphere and slightly warmer than observed by radiosonde.Fig. 6. Comparison of satellite and modeled sounding biases compared to all radiosondes in Alaska from 5 to 15 January 2015. Again, note warm bias at around 200 hPa in all datasets.