Photo By Mark Schauer | Precise knowledge of wind speeds aloft is critical to ensuring the safe conduct of...... read more read more
Subscribe
Extreme environment testing cannot be accomplished without meteorologists.
The extensive variety of U.S. Army Yuma Proving Ground (YPG)’s test activities means the proving ground’s meteorology team members must collect a wide range of data.
Yuma Test Center is responsible for conducting testing of military equipment in extreme heat. Testers look at the vast range as a giant laboratory, and need accurate, specialized meteorological data to conduct virtually any test that takes place.
“Our meteorological support touches a lot of the commodity areas here, especially munitions and weapons testing,” said Mark Hendrickson, lead meteorologist. “Almost every test done here has a requirement for atmospheric data to go along with it.”
To support these operations, YPG’s meteorology team must work in two shifts and be nimble enough to accommodate last-minute alterations to the test schedule. The extensive variety of test activities means YPG met team members collect weather data that measures small-scale phenomenon across a range larger in land area than the state of Rhode Island. While they gather ordinary meteorological data like temperature, humidity and wind speed, they also collect extremely specialized data like wet bulb globe temperature, which estimates the effect of heat and humidity on the body, which is critical information for worker safety in the intense heat of summer. Another example is scintillation, a measure of how energy is distorted by atmospheric conditions that is critical information to testers evaluating laser targeting systems.
Some munitions firing programs need to fire ammunition in completely cloudless conditions to ensure optimal tracking of projectiles in flight, a particularly challenging mission for the met team.
“We try to give them the best outlook of ‘windows’ when there won’t be clouds,” said Hendrickson. “We do this using satellite imagery and our local 4DWX weather model.”
Precise knowledge of wind speeds aloft is critical to ensuring the safe conduct of aviation tests, something the met team accomplishes with an electronic device known as a radiosonde attached to helium balloons to measure atmospheric conditions. YPG launches more of these balloons than any other entity in Arizona.
“Low-level helicopter and a great deal of unmanned aircraft work are dependent on lower echelon, upper level winds,” said Hendrickson. “Our balloon data helps munitions and weapons testers calculate the trajectory, range, and drift of their munitions. Our met data is vital to create safety fans for this testing.”
The meteorology team uses lasers beam to measure cloud height up to 50,000 feet above the range, a tool that is invaluable for aviation testing of unmanned aircraft and parachutes. Sonic anemometers determine wind speed by measuring its sound every tenth of a second. Aviation testers also like the team’s lightning strike indicator, which, like much of their data, is available on YPG’s intranet page in nearly-real time.
Safety is paramount in all operations at YPG, and the meteorology team keeps a careful eye on possible monsoonal activity, high winds, and other severe weather events that could prove hazardous to YPG personnel, particularly those working on remote parts of the test range. The comprehensive data that the YPG met team collects also ultimately benefits the entire meteorology field.
“Our data is back fed into global weather models, which helps increase the accuracy of those models, which in turn increases the accuracy of forecasts we put out.”
| Date Taken: | 05.18.2023 |
| Date Posted: | 05.18.2023 18:58 |
| Story ID: | 444518 |
| Location: | YUMA PROVING GROUND, ARIZONA, US |
| Web Views: | 95 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, Accurate weather data critical to U.S. Army Yuma Proving Ground test mission, by Mark Schauer, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
No keywords found.
