Gridding Localized Aviation MOS Program (LAMP) guidance for aviation forecasting

The Localized Aviation MOS Program (LAMP) was developed by the Meteorological Development Laboratory (MDL) to provide aviation guidance on an hourly basis out to 25 hours. LAMP first began running in NWS operations at the National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) in 2006, and in November 2008 LAMP began running every hour at NCEP. The multiple linear regression system produces statistical, objective guidance forecasts of sensible weather elements of interest to aviation forecasters, such as temperature, horizontal visibility, ceiling height, winds (wind speed, direction, and gusts), sky cover, obstruction to vision, precipitation probabilities, precipitation type, and thunderstorms. The LAMP thunderstorm guidance is available over the contiguous United States (CONUS) in gridded format on the National Digital Forecast Database (NDFD) grid, while the remaining guidance is point guidance valid at METAR station locations in the CONUS, Alaska, Hawaii, and Puerto Rico.

MDL is currently developing Gridded LAMP to provide objective guidance on a grid for the aviation community. Many users require gridded forecast guidance, and there is a great need for such guidance to be available hourly. The NWS Weather Forecast Office forecasters need gridded guidance for routine forecast preparation, and the hourly gridded forecast guidance from LAMP will be critical in the preparation of such forecasts as well as for rapid forecast updates. In addition, the Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen) requires probabilistic forecast guidance of aviation elements such as ceiling height and visibility for the Four-Dimensional Weather Data Cube (4-D Wx Data Cube), also known as the Weather Information Database (WIDB). MDL plans to provide Gridded LAMP forecast guidance grids for the aviation elements of temperature, dewpoint, wind, ceiling height, visibility, sky cover, obstruction to vision, and thunderstorms for use in NextGen.

For Gridded LAMP, the analysis package developed for gridding MOS forecasts is being modified to objectively analyze LAMP forecasts to a grid. Specific challenges exist in the gridding of LAMP forecasts, and especially for elements such as ceiling height and visibility which are of a discontinuous nature, so special modifications to the analysis scheme and software are required. In this presentation, the current status and plans for Gridded LAMP will be presented and the methodology of the gridding of the LAMP forecasts discussed. In addition, the special challenges to gridding LAMP forecasts will be detailed and the modifications to the analysis methodology examined. Examples of Gridded LAMP will be shown, along with results of various techniques tested in the development of the gridded guidance.