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Infra-Red Weather
Tue Mar 29, 2005
Listen in RealAudio 
Hi, I'm Bryan Yeaton for The Weather Notebook. Right now, our three-day weather forecasts are about 90 percent accurate. But when meteorologists try to predict the weather for next week, the odds are closer to 50-50. Now, a device riding aboard a NASA satellite may improve those odds. Correspondent Chris Richard tells us how.
The images transmitted down to earth by the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder resemble tie-died cloth. Deep purple swirls against flaming orange. Acid green bleeds into electric blue. The colors reflect subtle gradations of temperature. The atmospheric sounder, otherwise known as AIRS, can provide a reading for every 10 feet of elevation. Meteorologists can use that information to predict changes in the weather. Project leader Moustafa Chanine of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory says the device provides unprecedented detail for the entire planet. "We have 4,000 weather balloon launches per day. They are mostly over land. They provide us with about 4,000 measurements per day. From AIRS, we can provide 300,000 such measurements, covering not only land but also oceans, which are about 70% of the globe."
Hank Revercomb, director of the University of Wisconsin Space Science and Engineering Center, says the technology could bring big improvements in tracking tornadoes and hurricanes. "We're very excited about that kind of applicaton for this same type of instrument from a geostationary orbit, where you watch things change underneath you and so you can get detailed time resolution on things that are moving." Meteorologists are still learning how to use AIRS data, but project leader Chahine hopes forecasts will be twice as accurate by the end of the decade.
Chris Richard reports from Los Angeles. The Weather Notebook is produced by the Mount Washington Observatory. We are supported by the National Science Foundation, with underwriting from Subaru, Driven by What's Inside.
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