Deployments of a 12-site in situ Wind/T/RH instrument array in tornadoes

An array of 12 rapidly deployable in situ tornado observing systems has been developed and deployed in tornadoes. The in situ 'pods' contain redundant anemometers (RM Young blade-type and Gill ultrasonic), and a shielded T/RH sensor at 1 m AGL. Twelve such pods are deployed from three separate vehicles, which themselves are instrumented with similar instrumentation at 3.5 m AGL. Two of these pods, and the similarly-instrumented TIV armored vehicle were crossed by the tornado that damaged Stuttgart, AR, as confirmed by DOW radar scans overhead. One pod, the TIV, and one of the mobile mesonets were impacted by the core flow of a tornado in eastern AR, collecting data at 1 m, two locations at 3.5 m, while a DOW scanned at approximately 5-10 m AGL. Several pods, the TIV, and the DOW collected data in the tornado that impacted Glen Elder, Kansas. The data are being analyzed to determine the vertical dependence of winds, and to map the low level wind and temperature structure in the various tornadoes. The preliminary analysis of these data will be presented.