DeMaria, Molenar, Watson, Dostalek, Weaver, Zehr, Motta, Hillger, Zajac, Hilgendorf, Gosden

M. DeMaria and D. Molenar met with C. Matsumoto of CIRA and two programmers at the Forecast Systems Laboratory (FSL) in Boulder to discuss possible interactions in the development of applications for the Advanced Weather Interactive Processing System (AWIPS). The FSL personnel are extremely busy with the next few builds and will probably have little time for interaction in the next few months. They agreed to provide lists of available on-line documentation to aid in the establishment of the AWIPS at CIRA. They suggested that we continue to learn about the system in the next few months, but wait until Build 5, which is scheduled to be delivered late this year, before beginning application development. Build 5 should have extended capabilities for the development of user applications.

Loops of Rapid Scan and Super Rapid Scan GOES visible imagery were provided  to The Weather Channel for use in training and on-air promotions. Five tropical cyclone loops, a severe weather case, and a lake effect snow case were included in the examples. A brief description was also provided for each case.

B. Motta participated in a NWS/GHCC Workshop on Mesoscale Modeling and Short-term Convective Forecasting in Huntsville, AL, June 29-July 1.

D. Hillger attended the Suomi Atmospheric Radiation Conference in Madison WI June 28 - July 2.  A poster was prepared on "Using the new 1.6 µm channel on NOAA-15 in satellite product development."  Hillger also met with Tim Schmit about clustering of GOES soundings and with Chris Moeller about MODIS Aircraft Simulator data.

M. DeMaria  represented the RAMM Team at a U.S. Weather Research Program Meeting on a Pacific International Observing Experiment in Boulder, CO on June 28.

J. Weaver attended a CIRA-sponsored, one-day EMergency Manager's Weather Information Network (EMWIN) Workshop held at the Atmospheric Science Department at Colorado State University the week of June 11.   Basically, EMWIN streams all National Weather Service text products and some graphic files through the GOES satellites to users nationwide (at a 9,600 continuous baud rate).  Emergency managers in many large cities are now using the system which has a total startup cost of about $2,000 plus computer.  Exciting upgrades are expected over the next 1-3 years.  Beginning in late year-2000 EMWIN managers hope to begin rebroadcasting 5-min national WSR-88D Doppler radar data, and after the new generation of GOES is launched, they hope to provide full resolution satellite imagery as well.

B. Zajac attended the 11th International Conference on Atmospheric Electricity in Lake Guntersville, AL from June 8-11, 1999 and  presented a poster entitled "Characteristics of Cloud-to-Ground Lightning Activity in the Contiguous United States from 1995-1997" by B. Zajac, S. Rutledge, and L. Carey.  Interaction with other attendees proved fruitful, the full cloud-to-ground lightning data set from the National Lightning Detection Network (1988-present) was acquired and contacts were developed with researchers from federal agencies, private companies, and nonprofit groups.  These researchers may participate in the development of future VISIT training sessions on lightning for the National Weather Service.

J. Weaver traveled to San Diego for one day to present material on the Fort Collins Flood of 28 July 1997 at the 3rd National Conference and Exposition of the National Hydrological Warning Council, May 12 and 13.  The conference was well attended (more than 300 participants), with a mix of attendees that included about 70% hydrologists, and 30% meteorologists.  About half of the meteorologists were from the private sector.

E. Hilgendorf presented CIRA's work on the satellite radar overlays at the QPE workshop in Boulder, CO at COMET, April 13-15.  The overlay uses a Java Script algorithm developed by Tom Whittaker of SSEC-UW.

M. DeMaria attended the USWRP science steering committee meeting in Boulder, CO on April 1.

Dr. Peter Black from NOAA Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory, Hurricane Research Division, Miami, Florida visited RAMM Team the week of June 18.  Discussions included new experimental products, rapid interval image archive and tropical cyclone research topics.

Hiro Gosden (RAMM-CIRA), Andy Jones (CIRA), and Max Bleiweiss (Army Research Lab) met June 10  to discuss the functionality of RAMSDIS.   Mr. Bleiweiss was interested in getting the satellite information out to the Army field units using systems such as the RAMSDIS.

Marie McCauley and Crystal Miller from the Denver Regional Office of the Inspector General, U.S. Department of Commerce visited CIRA on May 19.  The were gathering information on tropical cyclone research with NOAA and cooperation between government  agencies. M. DeMaria and R. Zehr provided a summary of the tropical cyclone research at CIRA, and interactions with other research groups.

James Gurka, the satellite program coordinator for the NWS, visited CIRA on April 16. He met with several of RAMM Team staff members to discuss current research and product development at CIRA, policy on issuing RSO, NWS training programs at CIRA, and quantitative precipitation forecasting.

Frances Holt, Chief of Atmospheric Research and Applications Division, met with RAMM-CIRA members March 31 and April 1.

Mr. Zhao Licheng, Director of the Computer Division at the Satellite Meteorology Center in Beijing, China,  departed CIRA after a 7-month stay.  While at CIRA, Mr. Zhao made valuable contributions to the RAMSDIS Online project by converting existing software to Java.  The conversion will enable the addition of advanced features such as data readout and navigation to RAMSDIS Online in the future.