**GCOS TECHNICAL SUPPORT CENTER REPORT**

**CARIBBEAN AND CENTRAL AMERICA**

**DECEMBER 2004 -- February 2005**

**3^rd^ Quarterly Report**

**INTERMET, INC. April 20, 2005**

**Danny L. Foster**

**Sarasota, FL 34240**

**USA**

Danny L. Foster

Intermet, Inc

7732 Castleisland Drive

Sarasota, FL 34240

Business fone/fax + 941 379 3536

Home + 941 378 1313

Cell + 540 420 2255

<Intermet@comcast.net>

**In General**

The following report describes the activities of the Contractor during
the period December 2004 thru February 2005. The contractor's activities
were reduced during Dec-Jan because of the holiday season. During this
period the Contractor was asked to provide 2 interim reports. See
Attachment A

The Satellite Communication links from the GCOS sites to NOAA Centers,
DWD, UK, and JMS using the MetLab or the Corobor systems is not
satisfactory and does not work reliably and in some cases it doesn't
work at all. Certain sites have abandoned their Satellite system and
send their observations and CLIMAT/CLIMAT TEMP messages to NOAA
NCEP/NCDC via email using the NOAA EDIS system. The routine is for NOAA
to insert the observations and CLIMAT/CLIMAT TEMP messages onto the GTS
or other circuits for normal distribution. This EDIS system seems to
work satisfactorily. The solutions or "fixes" needed to reliably use the
METLAB and Corobor systems are not trivial and require a lot of
interactions between the vendors, NOAA gateway, and the GCOS site
itself. The Contractor has not been successful in getting the
appropriate people in NOAA to work with the sites to solve any of the
communications problems.

**GUAN SITES (now includes Curacao as the 7th observatory)**

While the observatories performed reasonably well during the period, the
nagging problems with the Proton Hydrogen Generators, the communications
links with NOAA, and inadequate expendables hinders the performance of
certain sites.

**Performance of Observatories during Dec-Feb 2005-04-27**

630 Observations were expected during this period and only 445 we
received at NCEP according to the THANKS2 report.

360 Observations were expected from the 4 sites using the Proton Energy
hydrogen generator. 80 observations were missed because of faults with
the Proton Energy generator.

**Expendable supplies for GUAN sites.**

The outlook for the provision of expendables (sondes and balloons) at
the 7 sites is favorable for the next 6 months.

**Observatory Remarks**

Barbados Fully supported by NOAA

Jamaica Fully supported by NOAA

Curacao Fully supported by NOAA

Belize Fully supported by NOAA

Manzanillo Full national support

San Jose NASA & GCOS providing short term support. Long term is a
problem.

Bogota Urgently needs support for RS-92 sondes. Limited budget and
demands by Hurricane Conference for observations at Rio Hache is
competing for funds needed for Bogota.

**Equipment Problems**

The Contractor dedicated a substantial amount of time and effort in
attempting to resolve the power supply problems at the Proton Energy
hydrogen sites. Because the Proton generators may or may not be under
some type of maintenance contract or continuing warranty the Contractor
is limited in providing support. The Contractor must be careful not to
violate some part of any NOAA agreement with Proton. Neither the
observatories nor the Contractor are privy to NOAAs existing agreements
with Proton Energy.

The Proton generator in Curacao failed again in December 2004. Both the
master and slave power supply units failed as they have at the other
sites in the Caribbean. NOAA recommended they do not install new power
supply units until they install the promised surge protection system.
NOAA/Proton has promised a power surge protection system at all the
sites in the Caribbean. The Contractor discussed the situation with the
Director of the Netherlands Antilles Meteorological service and decided
they could not discontinue the upper air program while they wait for the
NOAA/Proton surge protection system. Therefore the Contractor performed
a mission to the site and worked with the staff to reenergize the old
Stuart Hydrogen Generator. Currently the old generator is providing
enough hydrogen for one observation per day. This is a very tenuous
situation and the old generator could fail any day.

The water used to generate hydrogen at certain sites requires
considerable filtration and the sites need extra filters. The Contractor
has been providing these extra filters.

![](media/image1.wmf){width="5.990277777777778in"
height="1.6722222222222223in"}

![](media/image2.wmf){width="5.996527777777778in" height="2.81875in"}

Note: Average heights can be significantly increased by using larger
balloons such as . 600 or 800 grams balloons.

**System Problems**

The Contractor continues to believe there are internal problems at those
observatories using the Intermet Systems IMS1500C, Imetos data reduction
program. The Contractor has alerted NOAA to the problems. The Contractor
keeps the GUAN sites aware of each others problems in an attempt to
foster discussions concerning common problems and share solutions and
better ways of operating their sites. See Attachment B

**SPECIFICALLY**

The winds computations for Barbados had been in question by NCEP since
the new IMS1500c was installed several months ago. The winds continually
showed a bias of several degrees. The Contractor working with Barbados
and with NCEP has solved this problem and the winds are now considered
accurate.

With the exception of the above intermittent height errors and the wind
bias problem, the observations have been quite accurate according to the
NCEP monthly Inventory reports which shows only a few rejections per
month at the most.

Bogota used RS80 radiosondes during Dec/Jan. Winds cannot be computed at
Bogota using the RS-80 sonde because of rf interference problems. In
addition, no observations were reported during February because of
communications problems with the MetLab/NOAA link. The contractor and
the Colombian authorities have repeatedly asked NOAA to include them on
the EDIS system without any success.

The Contractor was asked to provide some support to the observatory on
Galapagos Island, Ecuador. The contractor found a difficulty with the
Proton Generator and helped the staff on the island solve the problem.
The government has since discontinued the email capability on the
island. The contractor is willing to add Galapagos as part of his
responsibility.

**CLIMAT TEMP REPORTS**

Hadley Centre reports that 4 of the 7 observatories in the Caribbean
submit the CLIMAT TEMP reports most of the time. Belize, Curacao, and
Jamaica submitted 9 of 12 CLIMAT TEMP reports. Discussions with the
Directors of the Meteorological Services present a perplexing problem.
The Directors assured the contractor that they do not compile or send
any CLIMAT TEMP messages to anyone. The contractor has contacted Hadley
Center and NOAA NCDC to determine who creates and sends in these CLIMAT
TEMP messages. No one at either center seems to know. The Directors also
want to see the CLIMATE TEMP messages to ensure the integrity of their
data.

**NOAA/NCEP THANKS2 AND UPPER AIR INVENTORY REPORTS**

The contractor has worked very closely with the Directors and Managers
of the upper air observatories to ensure the observations are received
at the Centers. During missions to the observatories the contractor
routinely the upper air staff how to view and use the THANKS2 report as
well as the monthly Upper Air Inventories. These two reports are very
important to the Directors and Managers to evaluate the performance of
their staff. The use of these reports does promote better performance
among the observatories. The contractor translated the THANKS2 report
into Spanish for our colleagues in Latin countries. See Attachment C

**GSN SITES (16)**

**In General**

The Contractor does not do realtime monitoring of the exchange of
synoptic and metar reports from the 16 sites. This would be too
difficult and time consuming for the contractor. However, monthly
evaluations of site activities are performed and the sites are queried
if there are a significant number of missing observations.

The contractor has performed missions to all the GSN sites with the
exception of those in Mexico. The missions to Mexico are scheduled to
begin on May 22, 2005.

**Some Background**

During the past 4 years, 2001-2004, the 16 sites were expected to report
480610 Synops and Metars. During that period they reported 362952
observations or roughly 76% of expected. During this period the sites
reported 64% of expected CLIMAT messages or 489 or 768. This low number
is primarily a result of communications problems. At least one site was
not aware of the CLIMAT message program The Contractor expects to see
the number of CLIMAT messages submitted to increase during April/May
2005. The Metrics in Attachment D Are Helpful in Visualizing all the
Statistics in this Paragraph.

The number of Synops and Metars are dictated by the function of the
observatory. Observatories located at busy airports are usually
operational 24 hours per day and take 8 synops and 24 metars routinely.
Observatories in Central America and some in Mexico are not full time
observatories and take fewer observations.

Of the 16 GSN sites in this report, 5 are located on very busy airports
in the Caribbean, 2 are at more remotes sites in Central America and the
9 in Mexico are a mix of airport and more remote type observatories. The
Metar observations comprise roughly 71% of all observations received at
centers.

During the period, the 5 Busy airports in the Caribbean provided 50% of
all observations, Mexico 41% and the two in Central roughly 9%.

**Contractor Comments**

The GSN observatories in the Caribbean and in Central America are
functioning well and require little support from the Contractor. All of
the evaluations and recommendations on observing practices, including
instrument placement, accuracy, recording, etc are in the original
reports and have not changed.

A couple of problems on the horizon include the migration from standard
instruments to automatic type instruments and the threat of the
observation fields at airports being contaminated by increased traffic
and possible relocation off the airport or to another less desireable
location.

At this time, the Contractor is evaluating some instruments for
replacements at some of the Caribbean/Central American sites.

The Contractor's primary support is to monitor the receipt of all
messages and to discussion down time or omissions with the observatories
to see if help is required. Again the primary problem is communications
links with Washington DC Gateway which requires the contractor to try
and get the two entities to discuss the situation. This is time
consuming.

The Contractor will be dedicating more time to the GSN sites in Mexico
beginning late May 2005. It is likely that the Mexican sites will
require some tuning up and replacement of some instruments. It is also
likely that some tools and test equipment may be required at the 9 GSN
observatories.

**METADATA**

As indicated in previous reports, the Contractor has compiled a
significant amount of METADATA type information. Discussions with NCDC
indicate significant changes are being considered for the basic METADATA
file. The Contractor has been advised to wait until these changes are
made official before rigorously pursuing and recording this information.
NCDC is to reveal the new standards and requirements in mid May 2005.

**Attachment A**

**MAINTENANCE PROJECT ACCOMPLISHMENTS**

**June -- December 2004**

**CARIBBEAN AND CENTRAL AMERICA GCOS OBSERVATORIES**

An experienced meteorologist and expert in observing techniques visited
all GCOS sites in Caribbean and Central America to investigate and
review all aspects of the observing programs to determine their
compliance GCOS requirements and goals.

The Contractor has worked very closely with 16 GSN sites and 7 GUAN
sites in the region to improve and maintain the integrity of the GCOS
networks.

Support has been provided in terms of the provision of equipment spares,
replacement parts, tools and test equipment and on-site technical
support.

The Contractor has developed a detailed and technical inventory of
equipment and instruments at each observatory including details on the
observing practices and GCOS activities at each observatory.

The Contractor has become the initial contact for the observatories when
technical or other difficulties disrupt or threaten their activities.
Many problems have been resolved via telephone or internet without
on-site missions.

National and regional telecommunications was identified as being the
primary reason for many observatories not providing observations or
CLIMAT/CLIMAT TEMP data to the GTS and GCOS centers. The Contractor
solved this problem at nearly all the silent or unreliable sites through
coordination and corrective measures with the observatories, NOAA
centers and Hadley Center. The Contractor established and funded initial
EMAIL links at certain observatories to ensure reliable communications
with their National Centers.

The Contractor has determined that none of the GCOS sites maintain a
current MEDTADATA inventory and NOAA/NCDC has no METADATA files on any
of the observatories. The Contractor is working with NOAA/NCDC to
acquire current METADATA from all the observatories.

The Contractor has developed a list of needs for each of the
observatories including replacement and spare parts, tools and test
equipment, improvements to basic infrastructure, and training in data
assimilation, CLIMAT/CLIMAT TEMP coding, and technical training for
maintenance technicians and observers/operators.

Established and maintains a pro-active and near realtime monitoring desk
that maintains vigilance and scrutiny over the international exchange of
surface and upper air observations as well as CLIMAT and CLIMAT TEMP
messages.

Nearly all the surface instrument fields are located at airports where
commercial traffic and construction activities are encroaching on the
fields causing spurious temperature, rainfall and wind measurements.
Airport authorities are forcing many of the observatories to move their
instrument fields to more remote locations. The contractor is working
with the observatories to identify new locations, purchase duplicate
observing instruments and beginning a program to compare the readings at
the new locations to the existing locations.

The contractor has established a cadre of bilingual electronic
technicians, observing experts and experienced climatological
specialists to provide support to the GSN/GUAN sites.

With regard to quality control of the upper air observations, Contractor
monitors the NCEP monthly upper air inventories of errors, rejections
and average sounding heights and discusses the reports with the
observatories and pursues corrective measures. The Contractor has
recommended the observatories begin using larger balloons to attain the
5 millibar height standard that GCOS requires.

**CLIMAT and CLIMAT TEMP REPORTS**

The contractor determined that only 60% of expected CLIMAT reports were
received at NCDC during Jan-July2004

4 of 17 GSN sites reported 100% of the time

9 of 17 GSN sites reported roughly 70% of the time

4 of 17 GSN sites were silent

Only 4 sites report all 4 CLIMAT groups, 111,222,333, and 444

The Contractor is initiating actions to overcome the above deficiencies.

Note: There are several years of upper air data and surface data
available at each site that could be put into CLIMAT TEMP or CLIMAT
format and provided to the GCOS centers.

**Attachment A cont.**

HEADLINES

March 17, 2005

Receipt of complete Upper Air Observations increased by 11% during first
six months of contract. July -- December 2004

Jan-June 2004 received 802 upper air observations, July --December 2004
received 902

Receipt of complete vs partial Upper Air Observations increased by 28%
during first six months of contract

Soundings above 20 Millibars increased from 330 Jan-Jun 2004 to 383
Jul-Dec 2004

Identified and corrected wind bias problem

Identified and alerted NOAA authorities to intermittent height error
problem with IMS1500C

METADATA does not exist for any GCOS sites. Contractor working with
NCSDC to begin create METADATA program for all sites.

Identified the primary problems at GUAN sites are:

Proton Hydrogen Generator Failures

Lack of training for Electronics Technicians on all ground equipment

Communications links with NOAA Gateway

Balloons too small to routinely reach above 10 Millibars

Observing staff needs training on iMetOS Compaq system

Inability to automatically transfer TEMP message from upper air system
to ISCS for insertion onto the GTS

Determined that none of the GUAN sites participate in the CLIMAT TEMP
program. Efforts to establish or resume participation are in place.

Improved the number of CLIMAT and CLIMAT TEMP reports received at NCDC
and Hadley Centre

Determined the accuracy of all GSN observing instruments and replaced
some

Provided expendable items for the GUAN sites, filters, etc

Provided internet email connection for remote GSN sites to reliably xmit
observations

Assisted Silent GSN site in becoming operational as well as doing CLIMAT
reports

Determined that nearly all GSN instrument fields on airports will have
to be moved

New instrument fields must be identified and comparisons started.

The contamination of air and instruments at airports is increasing.

Contractor expects current funding to be sufficient for 18 -- 24 months
instead of 12 months. Barring castrophies.

**Attachment B**

**CORRESPONDENCE TO ALL GUAN UPPER SITES USING THE IMS1500c**

**The staffs at all the IMS1500c sites were asked to review and comment
on the following. This was sent by emai.**

**l**

1\. Occasionally the Imetos program shuts down (crashes) during the
flight. This is an intermittent problem and does not seem to occur with
any particular set of circumstances. This leads to an even more serious
problem with the system. The observer will have to rework the sounding
to get a message for however high they got before the crash. The results
of the rework are very different than the data and message in the
original calculations.

2\. Occasionally negative RH values will be displayed during the flight.
However the coded message doesn't seem to be effected by this display
and codes the RH correctly. This intermittent event does concern the
observer and gives rise to doubting the accuracy of the observation.
However there is no software function for the observer to check these
data

3\. Occasionally the tropopause level is not in the coded message but it
is displayed in the standard level report. The observer must be alert to
this omission and manually insert the tropopause date into the coded
message.

4\. Occasionally the maximum wind level is not in the coded message but
it is displayed in the standard level report. The observer must stay
alert to this omission and manually insert the maximum wind level in the
coded message.

5\. Occasionally after the balloon has burst and is falling but still
transmitting data, the incoming data will replace the existing data for
the maximum wind. Once again the observer must stay alert to this
problem and make the necessary corrections.

6\. The actual time and date for the 00Z observation (YYGG) can be
misleading. An example is that if the observers are performing the April
15^th^ 0000Z observation and release the balloon on April 14^th^ at 2315
Z then the YYGG is coded as 6523 which indicates an observation on the
15^TH^ at 2300z. Hopefully the computers recognize this error.

**7.** The Vector Group v~b~v~b~v~a~v~a~ is not clearly understood by
many of the observatories and is often not calculated or included in the
messages.

8\. A most disturbing problem with the program is that height errors
sometimes occur for certain mandatory levels. Once again this is an
intermittent problem that doesn't seem to be related to any particular
set of circumstances. The heights of the 925, 850, and 700 Mb levels
seem to be in error. The temperature seems to be adiabatic but the
heights do not always look hydrostatic. The heights for some mysterious
reason seem to depart radically from the previous day . Often the local
forecasters question the validity of these heights.

The following table presents a summary of the heights and temperatures
for those 8 consecutive days. Note the radical differences in heights on
the 19^th^ and 20^th^ while the temperature seems to be consistent with
previous soundings.

+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+
| > Date 12Z 925 Millibars 850 Millibars 700 Millibars                  |
| >                                                                     |
| > Height Temp Height Temp Height Temp                                 |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+
| > April 15, 2004 823 m 20.4c 1556m 16.8c 3182m 7.4c                   |
| >                                                                     |
| > April 16, 2004 837 20.6 1546 16.8 3175 7.8                          |
| >                                                                     |
| > April 17, 2004 832 19.8 1553 16.0 3186 8.2                          |
| >                                                                     |
| > April 18, 2004 844 21.6 1565 16.4 3198 8.6                          |
| >                                                                     |
| > **April 19, 2004 876 20.2 1636 15.6 3269 9.2**                      |
| >                                                                     |
| > **April 20, 2004 791 20.0 1529 16.0 3164 9.6**                      |
| >                                                                     |
| > April 21, 2004 810 21.0 1538 16.4 3174 8.8                          |
| >                                                                     |
| > April 22, 2004 817 20.0 1549 17.8 3188 10.0                         |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+

The contractor will attempt to determine if this same intermittent
problem occurs at other sites using the same system and software. If so,
the manufacturer should be alerted to the problem and asked to make the
appropriate corrections to the system and World Centers should be
advised of the errors in past observations.

#  

# 

# 

# 

#  Attachment C

# Reporte actualizado \"Thanks 2\" de las Observaciones de radiosondeo 

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Observaciones de radiosondeo recibidas en el Centro Nacional de
Predicción del medio ambiente (NCEP, siglas en inglés), válidas para el
día 30 de junio del 2004 a las 14:00:01 TMG.

Esta página es actualizada cada 15 minutos entre las 0:45 y las 02:00 y
entre las 12:00 y las 14:00.

76151 76225 THKS 76256 ABc 76394 THKS 76405 THKS 76458 THKS

76526 ABc 76595 a 76612 a 76644 THKS 76654 THKS 76679 THKS

76692 THKS 76723 THKS 76805 AB 78016 THKS 78073 THKS 78355

78367 78384 THKS 78397 ABc 78486 THKS 78526 THKS 78583

78641 78720 78730 78762 THKS 78808 78866 THKS

78897 A 78954 THKS 78970 78988 80001 A 80035

80222 80241 80398 80413 80447 80462

80476

"A" significa que se recibieron los datos del grupo A (TTAA) completos.
"B" que se recibieron completos los grupos TTBB y PPBB. La "C" que se
recibieron completos los grupos TTCC, TTDD y PPDD. "THKS" significa que
se recibió el mensaje completo, con datos en todos sus grupos, para esa
hora específica.

A, B o C minúscula significan que se recibieron los datos pero están
incompletos para ese grupo específico.

Espacio en blanco significa que no se recibieron los datos para esa
estación en particular.

Este mensaje refleja los datos recibidos en el NCEP y el total de los
datos procesados por el sistema para esa hora.

Por favor retransmita los mensajes no recibidos. REENVÍELOS UNA SOLA
VEZ, NO REALICE RETRANSMISIONES REPETITIVAS.

Revise SDM y el administrador de mensajes Gateway cuando sospeche que
existen problemas de comunicación.

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NCEP Grupo de Soporte al Usuario/ última modificación: 30 de junio, 2004

**Attachment D**

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height="2.8020833333333335in"}

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height="2.8020833333333335in"}

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height="2.7916666666666665in"}

These Statistics cover the period of the existing Contract to date.

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height="2.8020833333333335in"}

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