A publication of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association
Issue link: http://natca.uberflip.com/i/816138
NWP and CS S - WX are progressing through the development stages. As part of this program is the Aviation Weather Display (AWD), this display will replace ITWS, CIWS, and the WARP displays in facilities that have them. The current AWD was on display at CFS in the Rayth eon booth and most feedback was very positive and controllers expressed the desire to have the display available at the sector and not just on supervisor desk in the back of the control room. The airport alerts on the display will be able to be inhibite d at TRACON and ARTCC sites. Remote Oceanic Meteorology Information Operational (ROMIO) Project The Team made site visits to ZOA, ZHU, and ZMA to brief on the ROMIO project and discuss how controllers can support the test that will be starting toward the end of the summer. This project will be sending polygons to the tablet that pilots use for access to w eather and flight information. The data is derived from the GOES - E and GOES - W satellites, which National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) then cre ates a Cloud Top, and Convection product that will be transmitted to the flight deck via the airlines commercial Internet provider. This test is being conducted with, Delta, United, and American Airlines. The plan is to use B777, B787, and possibly A350 ai rframes on long haul flights. This product is being targeted for the Inter - Tropical Convergence zone (ITCZ) where there is convection almost year round. ARTCC access to the product would be through a website and will be for situational purposes only. The p ilots involved so far do not really see any change in how they operate but may result in earlier requests for deviations to allow for better decision - making. Aviation Weather Observation Taskforce The agency has been conducting audits of Human Weather ob server sites (HWO)/(LAWRS), a number of the issues that are coming up are failing to sign off the ASOS OID when a tower closes, not documenting manual observations that are required for currency, augmenting the ASOS when a sensor is out of service or sendi ng the weather observation through AISR when the ASOS communications is out of service. The group is looking at some kind of recurrent training, as the only one that has been out in the field other than the full LAWRS ELMS is basically a refresher on how t he OID works and not on how to actua lly take a manual observation. Recommendations are to create a national refresher instead of leaving it up to the facilities to develop their own refresher training. Collaborative Decision Making Weather Evaluation Te am (CDM - WET) The WET team has been working on two tasks. The first is the Traffic Management Collaborative Forecast product (TCF) is a replacement for the old Collaborative Convective Forecast Product. The TCF starts with an automated first cut at the fore cast and then meteorologist from NWS and industry collaborate on changes to the forecast which is then transmitted every two hours and covers a 4,6, and 8 hour convective forecast this product is availab le via the TSD or the Avi ation Weather Centers website. The second task is to create a convective forecast product that runs out to 24 hours and beyond for next day weather planning. The first cut of this product is running on the AWC test bed and will go live later in the year.