85th AMS Annual Meeting

Wednesday, 12 January 2005
Integrating a Doppler sodar with nuclear power plant meteorological data
Thomas E. Bellinger, Illinois Emergency Management Agency, Springfield, IL
Poster PDF (2.3 MB)
On November 13, 2002, a large grass fire occurred near the Dresden Nuclear Power Station. This fire created a large plume of smoke that was visible on the Chicago NWS Doppler radar and was documented with numerous photographs. The photographs of the plume show an interesting vertical structure that could not be discerned from the onsite Dresden Nuclear Power Station meteorological tower data. The nearby IEMA Doppler sodar provided vertical measurements that explained the vertical structure of the plume quite well. Integrating the IEMA Doppler sodar with the meteorological measurements from Braidwood, Dresden, and LaSalle nuclear power stations ultimately provides emergency responders with a valuable picture of how and where accidental releases may be transported from these sites.

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