A New Technique for Stratus Forecasting in the San Francisco Bay Area

San Francisco International Airport (SFO), one of the world's busiest airports, experiences frequent delays due to weather, mainly due to morning stratus that spreads from the Pacific Ocean and the Golden Gate Bridge. Meteorologists from the National Weather Service (NWS) in collaboration with the Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) have worked on methods to forecast the burn-off time for the stratus clouds, which is important for determining when arriving flights can use visual approaches and land on-time. However, these forecasts are primarily used by pilots; the FAA and NWS forecast is not available until 13Z when the stratus may have already formed. The goal of this project is to find a way to forecast the timing and duration of the flight delays by the previous night by analyzing historical daily weather and flight delay statistics. Consumers for this forecast would include the general public through television, radio, and social media.