2005 NOAA Hurricane Balloon Experiments

RAINEX

August 15 - September 30, 2005

RAINEX / SMART BALLOON PLAN OF THE DAY

- Balloon 2 flight terminated

- 2005 Hurricane balloon experiments completed at this time

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For more information on other RAINEX operations, visit the official RAINEX homepage.

2005 NOAA Hurricane Balloon Experiments

A series of hurricane balloon experiments will be conducted during the 2005 hurricane season. NOAA hurricane balloons were developed at NOAA’s ARLFRD, in collaboration with the University of Hawaii and the University of New Hampshire, and will be deployed from the northwest coast of Puerto Rico as part of a Lagrangian experiment strategy to better characterize the evolution of the energy content of the marine boundary-layer inflow to hurricanes and its relationship with changes in hurricane intensity. In an environment where there may be significant cross-stream variability in the inflow, the hurricane balloons will provide critical in situ data on the thermodynamic history and trajectories of air parcels in the inflow layer. Hurricane balloon deployments will take place in the context of the hurricane rainband and intensity change experiment (RAINEX), an observational and modeling study of hurricane rainbands and intensity changes (http://www.joss.ucar.edu/rainex/ ). The Lagrangian experiments will complement the essentially Eulerian experiments carried out by the aircraft, so that the combined experiment is more than the sum of the individual experiments if they were carried out separately. The synergy between the two experiments capitalizes on the availability of new high-resolution Global Positioning System (GPS) dropwindsondes, turbulent flux sensors, and the Doppler radar on the NOAA WP-3D aircraft.

The principal participants in the NOAA hurricane balloon experiments include:

Mr. Randy Johnson, lead engineer, Shane Beard, engineer both at NOAA's ARLFRD (http://www.noaa.inel.gov/capabilities/smartballoon/). Randy and his collaborators constructed the hurricane balloons and will be in Puerto Rico to conduct the balloon staging and releases during the field experiment.

Dr. Steven Businger, PI and Ryan Ellis, PhD student, at the University of Hawai'i. http://www.soest.hawaii.edu/MET/Faculty/businger/rainex/RAINEX.html.

Steven and Ryan, will coordinate with the RAINEX experiment organizers (Dr. Bob Houze and Dr. Shuyi Chen), HRD and NHC regarding timing of balloon deployment. During the field experiment, Ryan will be at the RAINEX operations center, housed at the University of Miami's Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmosphere Science.

Dr. Robert Talbot, PI, and Dr. Don Troop and Dr. Huiting Mao, at the University of New Hampshire have contributed high tech ozone sensors that will be flown on the balloon.

GFS Trajectory Forecasts