Page 28 - atoday
P. 28
A28
SCIENCEWednesday 11 November
NASA, partners track rain, snow in soggy Washington
PHUONG LE David Wolff, a research scientist with NASA, opens the door to a measurements made by a The scientists are deploying
Associated Press mobile workspace, Friday, Nov. 6, 2015, below one of the large group of satellites are ac- an arsenal of equipment at
SEATTLE (AP) — Using ev- radar instruments installed on a hilltop near Moclips, Wash. curate; those satellites are all levels, including a high-
erything from a customized part of a joint mission of altitude aircraft, a variety
DC-8 jetliner to ground ra- Associated Press NASA and the Japan Aero- of radars, a network of tip-
dars to four-inch rain gaug- space Exploration Agency ping bucket rain gauges
es, scientists are fanning out dots between what we’re Petersen, NASA’s deputy that launched last year. and remote cameras that
across one of the soggiest seeing on the surface and project scientist for ground “There are a lot of parts in will provide images of snow
places in the United States what we’re seeing from validation. the globe where there are stake measurements in
this month to measure rain- space and what we’re see- Specifically, the scientists no weather radars and no higher elevations.
drops and snowflakes like ing in the clouds,” said Walt are making sure that global capability to put radars “We’re looking at ev-
never before. or a rain gauge in,” Pe- erything from above the
Led by NASA and the Uni- tersen said, adding that clouds down to the ground
versity of Washington, the such places rely on satellite in the river valleys,” said
field experiment on the weather forecasting. Robert Houze, a UW profes-
Olympic Peninsula at- So those satellites need to sor of atmospheric scienc-
tempts to validate, on the be able to accurately de- es and principal investiga-
ground, how well global tect heavy tropical rain, tor. While there have been
satellites measure precipi- light snowfall and other other field campaigns,
tation from space, which forms of precipitation. Such “none has ever been at-
is crucial for areas of the information would improve tempted in such rugged
world that lack rain gauges forecasting for floods and complex terrain where it’s
or other equipment. droughts as well as man- very difficult to set up mea-
The four-month long OLYM- agement of water resourc- surements on the ground to
PEX project will collect de- es. go with the ones from the
tailed atmospheric data The Olympic Peninsula, airplanes,” Houze added.
— right down to the size of home to a protected tem- The end result is to get
raindrops — that fall over perate rain forest, is an ide- a better way to predict
the ocean, along the coast, al for the project because precipitation around the
in the foothills and the rug- it’s in the middle of an ac- globe, Petersen said, add-
ged Olympic Mountains. tive winter storm track, said ing: “If you know what’s
Ground instruments have Lynn McMurdie, a UW re- going on right now, your
already started collecting searcher and one of the weather prediction model
data and NASA’s DC-8, a project’s lead scientists. is going to do a better job.”
flying science laboratory, It’s reliably wet on the pen- A number of partners are
arrives in Washington state insula, which typically re- involved in the project,
this week. ceives more than 8 feet including the Quinault In-
The idea is “to connect the (240 centimeters) of rain on dian Nation, Environment
the coast to about 15 feet Canada, the National Park
(4.5 meters) of snow in the Service and the U.S. Forest
mountains. The landscape Service.
changes from sea level to “We’re rooting for the rainy
over 6,500 feet (2,000 me- weather. We’re excited
ters) in a short distance of and we’re a little nervous,”
about 30 miles (50 kilome- Houze said. “Even after
ters), offering a compre- years of preparing, you’re
hensive picture of how pre- still dependent on nature
cipitation falls over such ex- giving us what we want to
treme differences in terrain. look at.”
