'An Overview of the 2019 Aviation Weather Testbed Summer Experiment'

The Aviation Weather Testbed (AWT) at the Aviation Weather Center (AWC) in Kansas City, MO., held their annual summer experiment in August of 2019. The experiment focused on evaluating experimental and prototype products and services to support aviation planning in the National Airspace System (NAS).

The three focus areas for the 2019 Summer Experiment were evaluating two of AWC’s evolving flight planning web tools used primarily by pilots, an evaluation of experimental 3D guidance and visualization techniques, and evaluating automated and user generated products to determine their potential to provide improved convective forecast guidance for extended range (Day 2-4) traffic flow management (TFM) planning. The FAA’s Aviation Weather Demonstration and Evaluation (AWDE) services group supported the experiment by providing structured evaluations and pilot interviews to evaluate experimental versions of the Graphical Forecasts for Aviation (GFA) and the Helicopter Emergency Medical Services (HEMS) tools. The experiment design, preliminary results, and potential transitions to operations will be detailed.