METEOROLOGY 361                                                                                                                                                      Spring, 2009       

FINAL EXAM

Directions: This is an Open-notes exam.  Use anything you want, including the Internet.  You can’t ask each other questions but you can ask me for clarifications (no guarantee that I’ll be able to answer). Answer all parts of the questions in the blue books or in a text file unless otherwise directed.  If you use a text file, please e-mail it to me at blechmjb@oneonta.edu.   You have until 4:30 p.m.

1. Perhaps the most famous single day tornado outbreak of recent years is the Super Tuesday outbreak of 2008. On that day, 24 states held primaries or caucuses, including Alabama, Tennessee, Arkansas, Missouri, and Illinois.  The SPC preliminary storm map (http://www.spc.noaa.gov/climo/reports/080205_rpts.html) shows a staggering total of 524 severe events in those states and many others. 

( 20%) Using standard symbols, create a composite chart for 12Z February 5, 2008 using the blank U.S. map provided.  You may ignore the area west of the Rocky Mountains. You must include the surface map, 850 mb map, 700 mb map, 500 mb map, and 300 mb map.  You decide what elements should be on your map.  On the map, put a key to what symbols you assigned to which element. In the blue books or text files, list the elements you picked and why you picked them.  You do not have to have any set number of elements, but you must have at least one from each map.  If an element is important, you can’t ignore it so some maps will have more than one.

2. Refer to the U.S. surface loop, 850 mb loop, 250 mb loop, a U.S. radar loop, and an IR satellite loop for a two-day period in July 2008.  Remember, if you need to view a loop frame-by-frame, download it and run it in Animagic.

            a. ( 8%) What areas should get warnings issued by the National Weather Service and what kind of warnings should those be? Do not pick individual stations.  Use general terms to describe regions, like northeast, lower Mississippi Valley, Rocky Mountains, etc.

            b. ( 8%) Using the guidance given, describe your reasoning for recommending warnings be issued.

3.  For this question you must imagine you are a researcher at the Blechman Academy for Diagnosis and Advanced Synoptics Symposia. (BADASS) You want to propose a project for funding by the National Science Foundation (NSF).  For this proposal you need to suggest the design of a grid-point numerical model to forecast weather for the New York-New England region.  Your model must be capable of depicting and forecasting all the weather phenomena shown in the satellite loop for May 2 (click here).  There are at least three scales of weather shown.  Click here for a surface plot for the last time of the loop. 

To forecast the three scales of weather phenomena in the loop, you need to design suitable elements of your model. 

            a. ( 4%) What will be your requirements for vertical resolution?  Justify your choice(s).

            b. ( 4%) Will you need nested grid(s) in your model?  Why or why not?

            c. ( 4%) What elements will need parameterization?  You don’t have to write parameterization schemes, just identify the forecast elements from the satellite loop which need them.

4. May 5 was the most intense severe weather day of the year 2003.  This question is about a cross section through the severe weather area.

You have three cross sections on 00Z May 5 (the evening before the severe weather broke out), all taken from Bismark (BIS) through Aberdeen (ABR), Topeka (TOP), Springfield (SGF), and Jackson (JAN).  The first cross section shows the isentropes and wind flags.  The second cross section shows isentropes and isotachs.  The third cross section shows isentropes and lines of equal mixing ratio.  In the last two, the isentropes are solid lines while the second isopleth is dotted.  The cross section line is shown on an upper air station map.

( 12%) What factors, favorable for severe weather, are shown on these three cross section views?  Name three from the cross sections given.  You don’t need to explain how each factor worked, but you must note where on the diagrams you found each one.

 5. This question is about the weather situation for April 25, 2009, depicted in the enhanced IR image from the College of DuPage, shown here.  Based on the satellite image and the surface plot for a nearly coincident time, 1423Z, shown here,

               a. ( 4%) What is the proper scientific name for the clouds over southern Wisconsin?  How do you know?

               b. ( 6%) What is the proper scientific name for the clouds over western Kansas?  How do you know?

6. For this question you need to refer to the loops for the period from 12Z Feb 8 through 00Z Feb 13.  By putting together 24, 48, and 72 hour forecasts from the NAM with 96 and 120 hour forecasts from the GFS, a continuous forecast loop can be generated.  You have the MSLP and 300 mb forecasts made in this manner.  You also have the NAM 500 mb height/vorticity forecast loop and 850 mb height/temperature forecast loop from the 00Z initialization on Feb 9. 

               a. ( 12%) The first frame of the MSLP loop is marked with a dot for the location of Buffalo, NY (KBUF).  What is the sequence of precipitation events during the 120 hour period at KBUF?  Assume the guidance you have been given is accurate.  You must extrapolate between the 24, 48, 72, 96, and 120 hour forecasts if precipitation will occur between those hours.

               b. ( 6%) Pick two cities which are at risk for heavy snow (> 4”) during the 120 hour period.  You might want to consult a map of NWS offices.

7. Run the IDV using the IDV 2.6 icon on your desktop. From the Dashboard, load the zipped bundle named GFS Mar 8-12 2009.zidv which is on your desktop also.

( 12%) For the four-day period including March 8-12, what was happening in the U.S.?  Write this as a summary, not a technological discussion.  You are to identify the major meteorological events, not analyze them.  For example, you might say on March 8-9 a powerful heat wave affected the eastern U.S. with temperatures in the 80’s and 90’s.  That didn’t happen so don’t use it but that is an example of the level of detail I want.  To see what happened better, you may add anything to the basic IDV display using the data already in the loaded GFS .zidv file.  Remember, you can go on the Internet to discover more facts about that time period.

You don’t need to save any IDV maps or bundles.

If you are done, please turn in the blue books (if you used them), the U.S. map, and the question pages.