20020226: NEXRAD composites on pscwx (cont.)

>From: Unidata Support <address@hidden>
>Organization: Plymouth State College
>Keywords: 200202201352.g1KDq9x06734 McIDAS ADDE NEXRAD composites

Jim,

I setup LDM ingestion and decoding of several composite radar products
on pscwx:

/huge/nowrad/1KN0R-FLT   <-  1 km Regional N0R composite (AREA)
             6KN0R-NAT   <-  6 km National N0R composite (AREA)
             1KN0R-NAT   <-  1 km National N0R composite (GINI)
             10KRCM-NAT  <- 10 km National RCM composite (AREA)

As I write this, no 10KRCM-NAT products have been received either at
pscwx or at its feed site, atm.geo.nsf.gov.

The idea behind having 4 different products is to give the user a good
comparison between the RCM composite and those created by Unidata (Chiz
using GEMPAK). A very interesting comparison can be made by loading the
MDR radar image (from the RTIMAGES ADDE group) in on frame, the 10 km
RCM composite in the next frame; the 6 km N0R composite in the next;
and finally, the 1 km N0R composite in the next, and then animating the
sequence:

SF 1
IMGDISP RTIMAGES/MDR STA=TWX EU=MDR MAG=2 REFRESH='EG;MAP H'
SF 2
IMGDISP NEXRCOMP/10KRCM-NAT STA=TWX EU=MDR MAG=2 REFRESH='EG;MAP H'
SF 3
IMGDISP NEXRCOMP/6KN0R-NAT STA=TWX EU=BREF24 MAG=2 REFRESH='EG;MAP H'
SF 4
IMGDISP NEXRCOMP/1KN0R-NAT LATLON=KBUF EU=BREF24 MAG=1 REFRESH='EG;MAP H;BAR'
LB 1 4
DR 3*20 40

This really shows how unuseful the MDR product is!

Note: the BREF24 enhancement is brand new.  I FTPed it over to the
McIDAS installation on pscwx so you could give it a whirl.

Try the following from McIDAS:

IMGDISP NEXRCOMP/1KN0R-NAT STA=TWX EU=BREF24 MAG=-5 REFRESH='EG;MAP H;BAR'

pick out an interesting feature from this image (today, Maine is the action
spot):

IMGDISP NEXRCOMP/1KN0R-NAT LATLO=42 72 EU=BREF24 MAG=-2 REFRESH='EG;MAP H;BAR'

or go all the way for the lake effects:

IMGDISP NEXRCOMP/1KN0R-NAT LATLON=KBUF EU=BREF24 MAG=1 REFRESH='EG;MAP H;BAR'

The ADDE datasets I setup on pscwx are:

NEXRCOMP/1KN0R-FLT   <-  1 km Regional N0R composite
NEXRCOMP/6KN0R-NAT   <-  6 km National N0R composite
NEXRCOMP/1KN0R-NAT   <-  1 km National N0R composite
NEXRCOMP/10KRCM-NAT  <- 10 km National RCM composite

I also setup data scouring in cron for 'ldm' to keep 48 of each image,
but this can be increased or decreased by editing:

/usr/local/ldm/decoders/prune_nexrcomp.csh

The value to modify is KEEP=48.

I will worry about the METEOSAT imagery some other time.

Please let me know what you think of the radar composites!

Tom