Aircraft Meteorological Data Relay (AMDAR) is a program initiated by the

World Meteorological Organization The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations responsible for promoting international cooperation on atmospheric science, climatology, hydrology an ...

. AMDAR is used to collect meteorological data worldwide by using commercial

aircraft An aircraft ( aircraft) is a vehicle that is able to flight, fly by gaining support from the Atmosphere of Earth, air. It counters the force of gravity by using either Buoyancy, static lift or the Lift (force), dynamic lift of an airfoil, or, i ...

. Data is collected by the aircraft navigation systems and the onboard standard

temperature Temperature is a physical quantity that quantitatively expresses the attribute of hotness or coldness. Temperature is measurement, measured with a thermometer. It reflects the average kinetic energy of the vibrating and colliding atoms making ...

and

static pressure In fluid mechanics the term static pressure refers to a term in Bernoulli's equation written words as ''static pressure + dynamic pressure = total pressure''. Since pressure measurements at any single point in a fluid always give the static pres ...

probes. The data is then preprocessed before linking them down to the ground either via VHF communication ( ACARS) or via

satellite A satellite or an artificial satellite is an object, typically a spacecraft, placed into orbit around a celestial body. They have a variety of uses, including communication relay, weather forecasting, navigation ( GPS), broadcasting, scient ...

link ASDAR. A detailed description is given in the AMDAR Reference Manual (WMO-No 958) available from the

Geneva Geneva ( , ; ) ; ; . is the List of cities in Switzerland, second-most populous city in Switzerland and the most populous in French-speaking Romandy. Situated in the southwest of the country, where the Rhône exits Lake Geneva, it is the ca ...

Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...

Usage

AMDAR transmissions are most commonly used in forecast models as a supplement to

radiosonde A radiosonde is a battery-powered telemetry instrument carried into the atmosphere usually by a weather balloon that measures various atmospheric parameters and transmits them by radio to a ground receiver. Modern radiosondes measure or calculat ...

data, to aid in the plotting of upper-air data between the standard radiosonde soundings at 00Z and 12Z.

References

Meteorological data and networks Meteorological instrumentation and equipment {{Meteorology-stub

Usage

See also

References