From 5 Minutes to 48 Hours: A New Weather Forecasting Paradigm

DTN/Kavouras Weather Services and Weather Decision Technologies have teamed together to introduce state-of-the-art short-term prediction and forecasting products tailored for broadcast meteorologists. The first of these products, DopplerCasttm, provides 5 to 60 minute forecasts of radar echoes with 5 minutes resolution. MetroCasttm, is a Numerical Weather Prediction model that provides forecasts from a range of 30 minutes out to 48 hours. The combination of these two technologies allows broadcast meteorologists to provide extremely accurate short-term predictions of hazardous weather events along with accurate forecasts of the weather to their viewers, bridging the complete forecast period from 5 minutes to 48 hours.

DopplerCasttm is based upon a patented technology developed by and licensed from Massachusetts Institute of Technology. DopplerCasttm utilizes sophisticated image processing techniques and a history of a full hour of Doppler radar images to forecast into the future the movement and evolution of radar echoes. Examples and verification statistics will be provided during the presentation.

MetroCasttm is a Numerical Weather Prediction System developed by and licensed from the Center for Analysis and Prediction of Storms at the University of Oklahoma. Using a user-friendly interface, the broadcast meteorologist can choose the domain and resolution of the model run. MetroCasttm, running on a local multi-processor workstation, accesses real-time data from a central server than performs sophisticated analysis of the data, including NIDS data, to provide initial fields for the Numerical Model. Examples and verification statistics will be provided during the presentation.

The combination of these two technologies coupled with the superior DTN/Kavouras television display systems, Triton RTtm and StormProtm, provide a new forecast and display paradigm for the broadcast community that allows users to easily grasp how they are going to be impacted by significant weather events from 5 minutes out to 48 hours.