AWIPS II Plugin Development in Support of the 2024 Dual-Pol Phased Array Radar Activity at the Hazardous Weather Testbed Experimental Warning Program

The NOAA Hazardous Weather Testbed (HWT) is a joint project of the National Severe Storms Laboratory (NSSL), Storm Prediction Center, and National Weather Service (NWS) Norman Weather Forecast Office. The HWT provides a conceptual framework and a physical space to foster collaboration between research and operations to test and evaluate emerging technologies and science for NWS operations. The HWT consists of two primary programs: the Experimental Forecast Program and the Experimental Warning Program (EWP). The EWP tests and evaluates new applications, techniques, and products to support Weather Forecast Office (WFO) severe convective weather warning operations.

In 2024, the EWP hosted its first Dual-Pol Phased Array Radar activity, inviting forecasters to explore and provide researchers with feedback on multiple aspects of dual-pol phased array radar data over the course of three operational weeks. The activity focused on data collected by NSSL’s Advanced Technology Demonstrator (ATD) installed at the National Weather Radar Testbed in Norman, OK, and is the first full-size, S-band, dual-pol phased array radar designed specifically for weather observation. The Advanced Weather Interactive Processing System (AWIPS II), a meteorological display and analysis package, was used for visualization and necessitated a custom data plugin in order to properly decode and store these new data. This presentation will provide a brief overview of the HWT activities and discuss the technical aspects of creating this AWIPS II plugin.