The Weather Forecasting Forum

We have described the problem with "1000-500 hPa thickness" in DAW in the section "Digital Atmosphere" on Sep, 27.
Many of you have read it, but no one tell us his opinion about the problem.
It`s no special European problem!
Today we want to ask the US and Canadian User:
What do you think about this problem?
Do you ever have noticed it?
Here is the script
ANALYZE,CONT EQUA=5400 COLOR=55:90:250 LINE=2 CONT LSTN=5400 COLOR=55:90:250 CONT CINT=60 DASH COLOR=200:0:0 SDIF=1:2 STOR=2 HGHT H000 STOR=1 HGHT H500
#ANALYZE,HILO CONT CINT=4 LINE=2 SLPR HSFC
#product,plf,0,Surface Plots

If the 1000 hPa-level is negative, the WMO sets a "5" in front of the coded level and a "6" if the level is more than 100 meters below the station-level.
So the term "509" means a level of "-9" gpdm.
In the calculation of the "1000-500 hPa thickness" the term "509" are subtracted from the full 500-hPa-level with some very curious maps (see the following map).



You can make the corrections with the "Quality Control Panel".
You mark the area with the wrong data and start the "Quality Control Panel".
You will find some stations with values like "549" in the field "Height".
You delete the value "5" and set a "minus" instead of it, Accept Entry and afterwards make a new run of the script and you will have the corrected map.



Anyone else who has made these experiences?

With best regards,
Stefan Lichius + Jens Waterboer

Stefan,

What is the date, time, and source of the data you used to create the above maps? Just curious as it is probably from a couple of days ago:)

Thanks

Pat

Hi Pat,

the date is Octobre 17th at 00Z and the data source is http://weather.cod.edu/digatmos/upa/

best regards,
Stefan

Hi Stefan,

Downloaded the 12Z dta for this morning and what you are talking about is obvious from the Great Lakes to the Mid Atlantic. I can't really think of a way to change that 5 to a minus sign using a DA WS script. Hopefully we aren't stuck using the control panel all the time - that method is effective, but cumbersome.

My suggestion, for now, for US users:
http://weather.unisys.com/upper_air/ua_con_thick.html


Pat