Join Leave Welcome to the Air Traffic Cafe' website. We Hope that you enjoy your visit. But as far as aviation is concerned, there has been considerable progress in doing something about thunderstorms, wind shear and other such hazards to flying that together are blamed for the majority of airline delays. National Convective Weather Forecast maps thunderstorms, color coding them for intensity. Levels 3-6 present a hazard to aviation.
White lines indicate velocity and direction of storms.
Blue polygons are predictions of positions of level 3-6 storms 1 hr. later. For decades, meteorologists have focused on forecasting weather 24-36 hr. into the future. Since June 1, an FAA-funded NCAR project has been offering a sophisticated storm map and graphical forecast on the Internet and updating it every 5 min. It's an outstanding tool. What we're trying for is very specific information.