The Australian nowcasting system

During the last decade there has been an increasing need and desire to use radar data quantitatively as well as qualitatively in Australia to underpin short-term weather forecast products. As part of the World Weather Research Programme's Sydney 2000 Forecast Demonstration Project the first version of the Australian Nowcast System (ANS) was tested and used to provide input to short-term weather forecasts for the Sydney 2000 Olympics.

The paper is designed to provide a current overview of the ANS. Its history and rationale for development is first discussed. Next the system is presented in an end-to-end fashion; (1) how the radar data is collected in real-time, (2) the Nowcast Server, where various radar algorithms such as Warning Decision Support System (WDSS), Thunderstorm Identification, Tracking Analysis and Nowcasting (TITAN) and Rainfields (quantitative radar rainfall data) are run on the radar data and algorithm output produced, (3) the various nowcast client systems and services they provide, from 3D-Rapic that the forecaster uses to visualize the radar data as well as the algorithm output, to the Thunderstorm Interactive Forecasting System (TIFS), that provides the infrastructure to produce a range of short-term forecast products. The paper concludes with some future plans for the ANS.