From: elmore@rap.ucar.edu (Kim Elmore)
Subject: Re: ASRS CALLBACK # 163 (December, 1992)
Organization: NCAR, Research Application Program
Date: Tue, 5 Jan 1993 16:28:02 GMT

In article <jcmorris.725744089@mwunix> jcmorris@mwunix.mitre.org (Joe Morris)
writes:

	Excellent stuff posted; thanks!

>   Sifting through these complaints, we discovered that many of these pilots
>   apparently had been content at briefing time to be *inert recipients of
>   whatever the system delivered*, rather than becoming active participants
>   in the weather briefing process -- questioning, comparing, analyzing.
>   Not one reporter indicated that he or she had obtained temperature-dewpoint
>   data, an important indicator of the condition of the atmosphere.

	This is a serious problem with the weather info that pilots
are generally given.  I'll put on my meteorologist hat and say that
pilots simply should not be expected to be meteorologists.  Pilots
have not, in their training, been given the knowledge to truly
*analyze* meteorological data.  Remember: on the private written,
*EVERY* weather related question can be missed and the test still
passed.

	The FAA is realizing this and has contracted research
institutions to work on presenting *analyzed* products to the aviation
community.  The institutions involved are NCAR, MIT Lincoln Labs and
the Forecast Systems Laboratory, part of the Wave Propagation
Laboratory which is part of NOAA.  As meteorologists *and* pilots, we
recognize that the current system is good only at delivering data and
not at delivering analyzed products, which is what pilots really need.
Sure, some raw data is needed (visibility, ceiling, temp, dewpoint,
wind, altimeter) but onlt at a few places.  For the most part, pilots
really need useful, analyzed products *not* data.

	To do this requires, among lots of other things, better
forecast models, better data presentation (display) and better data
availability.  And lots more computational capability than currently
exists in the system.  An example: you call DUAT and get a briefing
for Somplace, IN.  You ask for a string of SA's.  The weather is
questionable and you wonder whether conditions will be above your
personal minimums for the approach.  So, you decide you want to see a
trend of some parameter (dewpoint, wind direction, whatever you decide
is important).  Out comes the graph paper and a pencil as you decode
all this stuff and draw your picture.  Why do we have to do this?  Why
can't we request such an analyzed product that includes all the
specials, mash a button and see it on a screen?  That's just one
example.  You can all come up with thousands more.  It's a good thing
it doesn't take a rocket scientist to do stuff like this, since I'm
just a research meterologist :-)

	There is a huge capital improvement program underway within
the FAA to provide just such products.  They won't be here overnight,
but we are already preparing prototype systems for the Initial
Operational Capability demo this summer.  As things progress, you'll
hear more about it all (I'm only working on a few aspects of a huge
program) but you may see some prototypes at some FSS's this summer.

	Of course, it's more than just deciding what pilots,
controllers and briefers want to see and giving them that.  In fact,
that's a sure-fire way to create a useless (or nearly useless)
product.  We do lots of research on what users think they want, create
what we thought they asked for and once they see it, find out what
they *really* wanted :-) And then tweak that product until it fills
the bill.  There's lots of interaction with end users, which makes the
works doubly exciting.

	It's not that we don't recognize, or haven't until now
recognized, the problems.  We just within the past couple of years got
the green light (greenbacks?) to address them.


					Kim Elmore
					N5OP, PP ASEL/Glider 2232456
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