12 January 1974, 0600 UTC surface chart showing the strongest storm of the
decade to strike Ireland. Widespread damage was reported across the island. Kilkell in County Down
reported winds of 108 kt, and nearly 150,000 customers were without electrical power. (Click for the full map)
03 February 1991, 1200 UTC showing the onset of a severe winter
storm that affected much of Europe. The strong anticyclone in Scandinavia was nearly stationary all
week and provided a strong easterly fetch of arctic air from Russia into Europe. By the 6th, much of
the UK was affected by snow showers with daytime temperatures staying below -5 C.(Click for the full map)
03 June 1994, 1200 UTC. An unseasonably strong cyclone moves across
Great Britain. The dataset author, Tim Vasquez, was at RAF Fairford at the time, forecasting B-1B
overflights of Normandy for the 50th anniversary commemoration a few days later. June 3rd
was the windiest, most unsettled day of his month-long stay in the UK.
(Click for the full map)
07 December 1952, 0000 UTC showing the start of the Great Smog event,
popularly associated with London but which also affected much of central Europe. Note the subfreezing
temperatures in England.(Click for the full map)
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EUROPEAN SURFACE ARCHIVES
Price:
$129.00
Availability:
IN STOCK
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NEW IN AUGUST 2010!
European Surface Archives is an massive, unprecedented dataset of historical observations for Europe, Russia, and the North Atlantic.
Up until now, we have only been able to offer a product like this for North America, but after
aggregating data from numerous sources and beginning development work starting in April 2010, we are
finally able to offer the European equivalent!
This data is designed especially for working meteorologists, amateur forecasters, the aviation industry,
investigators, energy companies, and insurance firms.
It provides hourly observations in SYNOP and METAR format, which are common, universal, non-proprietary formats recognized worldwide since the 1950s.
Format descriptions are readily available from many sources on the Internet.
No expensive or arcane software is required.
The data is fully sorted into hourly collectives and is ready to use.
Load it in your favorite weather analysis program, such as Digital Atmosphere or GEMPAK, or read it in any text editor.
Technical description
Provided here is a technical description of European Surface Archives:
- Dataset size. 37 GB (9.1 GB zipped).
- Media. This set is provided on three DVD-Rs; any computer DVD drive will read them.
To minimize the number of discs required, all files are zipped by year-month (with name yyyy-mm.zip, e.g. June 4 1984 files are found in 1984-06.zip).
- Format: Data is provided in METAR (WMO FM-15), SYNOP (WMO FM-12), and SHIP (WMO FM-13) format, with sorted collectives provided by station and by hour
for easy use.
Each hour has one METAR and one SYNOP file.
To maximize the clarity of this data, stations all use Epoch 2010 identifiers, which means that the plots will display correctly in ANY meteorological
software that containing station identifier listings considered current for 2010.
In other words, Ramstein AFB Germany will always be ETAR in this set instead of the Cold War identifier of EDAR, and Berlin Schonefeld appears as
EDDB instead of the East German identifier ETBS. We have taken care of all transcoding.
- Areal coverage. Coverage is for the entirety of Europe and Eurasia, including Greenland, Iceland, Turkey, and all of Russia and the
former Soviet Republics. In technical terms, the coverage is for all of the 0xxxx,
1xxxx, 2xxxx, and 3xxxx WMO blocks. Ship synoptic reports are provided for all locations north of 30N and between 120W and 180E.
For complete information, consult this map.
- Time period. The usable time period is 1930 to June 2010, though a handful of stations exist for 1901 to 1929 but not enough to make
a good surface chart. Coverage is erratic during and immediately after WWII.
There are some gaps in May and early June 2010 due to data loss at our office after the May 10 tornado, but we expect to fill these in a later update.
Ship synoptic observations start in January 1973 onward.
Full METAR remarks are provided starting in January 1973 onward.
- Frequency. Data is hourly, though we do adhere to WMO Resolution 40 restrictions on certain intermediate synoptic reports.
- Sample files for 9 November 1989, date of the fall of the Berlin Wall:
METAR and
SYNOP.
Also here are some sample stations for November 1989, constructed with a simple FIND command in MS-DOS:
Berlin/Tempelhof,
Oslo/Fornebu, and
Buchel Air Base.
- Sample graphics by year (March 15, 0000 UTC on selected years), useful for evaluating geographic coverage.
Crowding of station plots is intentionally set to "high" to show coverage, but to avoid cluttering the map excessively, not all plots are
shown in congested areas:
1905,
1910,
1915,
1920,
1925,
1930,
1935,
1940,
1945,
1950,
1955,
1960,
1965,
1970,
1975,
1980,
1985,
1990,
1995,
2000,
2005.
Note the increased coverage over the oceans starting in the early 1970s.
- Other notes. Most observations before 2003 are not originals but are postprocessed; this is partly because older observations were
not saved in full due to the astronomical cost of magnetic storage, and because the older pre-1990s METAR format is not compatible
with most modern data viewers. However we have strived to faithfully reproduce all observations. METAR remarks are the actual originals.
- Warranty. This dataset is provided strictly as-is. Only limited quality control has been performed and we do not
make any guarantee as to its performance or accuracy. This is not a replacement for original longline/teletype data.
Frequently asked questions
Q. Will data be released for other parts of the world?
Yes. European Surface Archives is part of the Global Archives data package we are developing to cover the world. As an owner of European
Surface Archives you will be entitled to buy other Global Archives volumes at a discount when they are released.
Q. Can this product be downloaded?
No, because of the extremely large size. This package spans many gigabytes. If you have an emergency deadline we can provide small portions (less than 250 MB) for
download with your purchase for a $50 one-time service fee; contact us for more information.
Q. What are some tips on viewing with Digital Atmosphere?
We recommend importing both the METAR and SYNOP file pair simultaneously by going to "Import File", Ctrl+click on each to select both file pairs, and then
import them. This will give you a little more data density. Also since Digital Atmosphere does not natively "drill down" into ZIP files
(which is what European Surface Archives are comprised of) if you have a large hard drive you may want to consider unzipping the entire dataset
onto your hard drive for easy access (37 GB required). By this fall we are going to upgrade Digital Atmosphere to handle ZIP
files directly, since it is becoming a common format for data archive storage.
Q. Do I have to use a viewer like Digital Atmosphere?
Definitely not. These are in readable METAR and SYNOP format, so if you are a pilot or are good at "reading" these formats, you can
easily peruse them in a text editor. They'll also work in any software that ingests METAR and/or SYNOP format, which includes GEMPAK
and other off-the-shelf viewers.
Q. Does this dataset provide frontal locations?
No, frontal locations are not supplied, though with cursory inspection or analysis of the chart it is possible to locate them. Some third-party products
such as GEMPAK are capable of analyzing the data to find axes of frontogenesis, but there is no machine algorithm that exists which is capable of
plotting a complete frontal analysis. Trained, human subjective analysis is required to locate the fronts.
However nearly all viewers, including Digital Atmosphere and GEMPAK, will plot isobars, highs and lows, isotherms, and other such fields using this dataset.
Q. Will this product be updated?
Yes, it will. We will be updating European Surface Archives each January. If you are already a registered user of this product, you may request
an updated disc set at a later date by clicking
here
or contacting us directly.
How to get it
European Surface Archives is only available here in our online store.
Simply add it to your cart (at the top right of this page) and check out.
Alternatively, call us or e-mail us at our contact page to place an order.
Shipping is from Oklahoma, USA, so if you are in Europe please allow several days for it to arrive (we ship International Priority Mail).
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