Common Cause
Weather for Pilots and ATC, or not
For many of us, the VFR flying season is over, and we need to pay more attention to the weather, lest it bite us in the wallet after the repairs are completed. If you only fly in VMC, or your plane of choice is only VFR capable, READ NO FURTHER. You probably know it all, or have been so baptized by bad weather experiences that you aren’t going there ever again. For the rest of us who have reasons to get from “A” to “B” on a given day, and have the avionic toys to help, we need to get the best weather information possible.
Most of us are familiar with the FAA requirement for pilots to obtain ALL available relevant information to our flight, weather and facilities, etc. Many have chosen to select one or two prime sources of information that we can rely on for accuracy. You can always call AFSS, get a weather briefing and NOTAMS, and file a flight plan. Numerous folks have chosen to use DUATS (either CSC or DTC versions) to get the same data via the Internet. Both methods offer the legal protection of documenting your receipt of a pre-flight weather brief. Some of us can’t get enough data, and want more assurance.
Those pilots have discovered the National Weather Service (NWS) ADDS website, www.aviationweather.gov; it is poorly advertised in the aviation press, but it a treasure drove of better weather data than the other sources. Even the new FAA Aviation Weather Services AC-00-45F recognizes its value. The operational side of the website is fed by the NWS Aviation Weather Center (AWC), and provides more and better weather radar, satellite images, icing, turbulence, ceiling & visibility, winds, temps, and convection products than The Weather Channel or AFSS. The experimental side of the website is maintained by the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), and showcases the supplemental weather products under development; these are accurate, with both current and forecast products, and hungry for user feedback. Use them all and be better informed for your flight planning.
Out of sight to most of us are the weather processors and products used by the FAA ATC community to help run the daily traffic flow through the skies. Big news here: they use different products and different displays in the towers, TRACONS and ARTCCs then those that are available to us. The WARP (Weather and Radar Processor) and ITWS (Integrated Terminal Weather System) processors feed the controllers on the scopes, and don’t offer all the pretty colors we are familiar with to differentiate weather. The aviation research community has provided ATC managers forecast products like LAMP and CCFP (Consolidated Convective Forecast Product) to make strategic flow decisions, and labs like MIT/LL have developed CIWS (Corridor Integrated Weather System) displays for them, driven by state-of-the-art weather models and algorithms. The FAA has funded them to continue their work with products like CoSPA (Convective Severe Prediction Algorithm), extending convective forecasts out to 8 hours with a resolution of 3 km. Magic indeed.
The current bevy of FAA solutions under the mantle of the NextGen program are all based on the fundamental need for better weather information to all the stakeholders and participants, focused on reducing the adverse impacts to the national airspace and traffic flows. Satellite data links to our cockpits (XM WX), providing commercially available weather data to pilots, are a tremendous advance for tactical use; too bad the heavy iron guys aren’t allowed to use it, nor are the airlines capable of funding the installations in their planes. Turns out, the passengers in the back have better access to current Internet weather data than their pilots. When cell phones are authorized, weather data will be available in your hands, but not to the FAR 121 pilots. We should be thankful.
Common Cause: Current and accurate weather information is essential to our survival when we fly cross country, when the conditions are IFR, and when the weather is changing rapidly. Don’t guess. Know. Take the time to gather the latest and the greatest weather products, so you can make informed, and safe, decisions. Have a favorite weather source? Let’s hear from you: this paper serves us all.
Mike Sullivan
COM SMEL, CFI, MEI, INSTRI
C177pilot@live.com KHEF