The meteorological monitoring system for the Kennedy Space Center/Cape Canaveral Air Station

The Kennedy Space Center (KSC) and Cape Canaveral Air Station (CCAS) are involved in many weather-sensitive operations. Manned and unmanned vehicle launches, which occur several times each year, are obvious example of operations whose success and safety are dependent upon favorable meteorological conditions. Other operations involving NASA, Air Force, and contractor personnel, including daily operations to maintain facilities, refurbish launch structures, prepare vehicles for launch, and handle hazardous materials, are less publicized but are no less weather-sensitive. The Meteorological Monitoring System (MMS) is a computer network which acquires, processes, disseminates, and monitors near real-time and forecast meteorological information to assist operational personnel and weather forecasters with the task of minimizing the risk to personnel, materials, and the surrounding population. CLIPS has been integrated into the MMS to provide quality control analysis and data monitoring. This paper describes aspects of the MMS relevant to CLIPS including requirements, actual implementation details, and results of performance testing

Paper Session I-B - An Operational System for Launch Area Hazard Prediction and Mitigation

The Meteorological And Range Safety Support ( MARSS) system provides the Air Force and NASA with a combined meteorological/toxic hazard support capability to protect personnel and property engaged in vehicle processing, material handling, launch preparation and launch support activities. The primary users for MARSS are the Air Force\u27s 45th and 30th Space Wings and NASA\u27s Kennedy Space Center. These organizations provide joint base toxic and hazard support activities for their facilities, personnal and surrounding communities. The MARSS system is the result of a highly successful technology transfer from innovative research to operational product and provides: • Quality analysis of weather measurements from over 70 different instruments • Extensive set of meteorological and hazard prediction tools for 2 and 3- dimensional toxic material release, blast hazards and risk to human life • Use of expert systems technology to monitor real-time weather measurements in order to detect user specified hazardous conditions and alert when they are detected • Continuous (24 hour/7 day) availability The use of the MARSS system saves money through the improved efficiency of functional consolidation and integrated communication tools. A single user can now perform a series of support tasks that had previously taken 2-3 personnel. It further enhances communications between Government safety personnel and local town, county and state emergency response planners and personnel

Paper Session I-B - Development and Operational Applications of a Real-time Range Data Simulator

Whenever a rocket is launched at any U .S. Space Launch Range, safety systems are in place to ensure that human life, health, and property are protected. These range safety systems rely on accurate knowledge of where flight vehicle debris would land in the event of a mishap. They must precisely process and display data from the rocket and ground sensors, and not react in an unpredictable manner to non-nominal or erroneous data. ENSCO has developed the Real-time Instrumentation Simulation Environment (RISE) to evaluate and operationally certify real-time range safety critical systems at space launch facilities. Various RISE configurations thoroughly test range safety critical systems by simulating, injecting, and recording up to 40 simultaneous real-time links of nominal and non-nominal vehicle tracking data, including ground sensor outputs and full-rate telemetry data. RISE simulators include options for the introduction of noise, data dropouts, quality defects, divergent trajectories, single or multiple source latencies, and numerous other data perturbations. By overlaying current timing in the data stream and computing and inserting checksums in real-time, RISE data is indistinguishable from operational mission data. With RISE, launch ranges have the ability to simulate a complete vehicle launch for both nominal and non-nominal conditions. Tests can be ·carefully controlled to validate range safety display systems, identify defects, or support training of operations personnel

Adaptation of Mesoscale Weather Models to Local Forecasting

Methodologies have been developed for (1) configuring mesoscale numerical weather-prediction models for execution on high-performance computer workstations to make short-range weather forecasts for the vicinity of the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) and the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station (CCAFS) and (2) evaluating the performances of the models as configured. These methodologies have been implemented as part of a continuing effort to improve weather forecasting in support of operations of the U.S. space program. The models, methodologies, and results of the evaluations also have potential value for commercial users who could benefit from tailoring their operations and/or marketing strategies based on accurate predictions of local weather. More specifically, the purpose of developing the methodologies for configuring the models to run on computers at KSC and CCAFS is to provide accurate forecasts of winds, temperature, and such specific thunderstorm-related phenomena as lightning and precipitation. The purpose of developing the evaluation methodologies is to maximize the utility of the models by providing users with assessments of the capabilities and limitations of the models. The models used in this effort thus far include the Mesoscale Atmospheric Simulation System (MASS), the Regional Atmospheric Modeling System (RAMS), and the National Centers for Environmental Prediction Eta Model ( Eta for short). The configuration of the MASS and RAMS is designed to run the models at very high spatial resolution and incorporate local data to resolve fine-scale weather features. Model preprocessors were modified to incorporate surface, ship, buoy, and rawinsonde data as well as data from local wind towers, wind profilers, and conventional or Doppler radars. The overall evaluation of the MASS, Eta, and RAMS was designed to assess the utility of these mesoscale models for satisfying the weather-forecasting needs of the U.S. space program. The evaluation methodology includes objective and subjective verification methodologies. Objective (e.g., statistical) verification of point forecasts is a stringent measure of model performance, but when used alone, it is not usually sufficient for quantifying the value of the overall contribution of the model to the weather-forecasting process. This is especially true for mesoscale models with enhanced spatial and temporal resolution that may be capable of predicting meteorologically consistent, though not necessarily accurate, fine-scale weather phenomena. Therefore, subjective (phenomenological) evaluation, focusing on selected case studies and specific weather features, such as sea breezes and precipitation, has been performed to help quantify the added value that cannot be inferred solely from objective evaluation