At this school, having students stare off into space is actually encouraged.
Physics & Astronomy professor Wayne Hocking makes adjustments on a radar tower built by international students during a radar school May 12-16.
Including presentations on a variety of practical aspects related to MST (Mesosphere-Stratosphere-Troposphere) radar applications, students from as far away as India, Belgium, U.K., Costa Rica, Germany, the U.S. and Canada were at Western for a four-day international radar school May 12-16.
The school involved hands-on analysis of real data from wind profiler radar towers constructed by the students, along with five radars relatively close to the university. Led by Physics & Astronomy professor Wayne Hocking, the school covered meteorological applications, upper atmospheric applications, VHF and HF radars, as well as meteor studies with these radars.
“Radar wind profilers are instruments which measure wind speeds and other related parameters within the atmosphere over a relatively deep region,” says Hocking who along with York University atmospheric science professor Peter Taylor are part of an Ontario-Quebec VHF wind profiler radar network.
“Depending on the frequency and power used, this height region could cover typically 400 meters altitude to 10 or 15 kilometres altitude, and even as high as 25 kilometres for the most powerful radars.”
Unlike the more widely known weather radars, which primarily produce horizontal maps of precipitation and its motion (and which are sometimes referred to as Doppler radars), wind profilers use near-vertical radar beams.
However, their potential remains largely untapped. One reason is numerical weather prediction models are not yet able to fully utilize the large amounts of data. Most major weather centres, including the Meteorological Service of Canada, are working to develop such schemes.
Canada has limited capabilities in this area. Three existing VHF wind profilers are capable of regularly measuring winds above two kilometres: London; Resolute Bay (Nunavut), and McGill University.
“Our overall objective is to establish a network of wind profiler radars within Ontario and Quebec, with the intention to use it to demonstrate the usefulness of such a network to weather forecasting and atmospheric science,” says Hocking. “The network will be closely linked through the internet, with frequent updates of data supply to a central server for access by all relevant researchers.”
The radar school was held just prior to the MST12 workshop, which provided a unique forum for scientists, engineers and students to discuss technical, scientific, engineering, observational and application aspects.