The Q1FY16 RTMA/URMA Upgrade Package (v2.4.0)

Manuel Pondeca, Steven Levine, Jacob Carley, Ying Lin, Yanqiu Zhu, Jeff McQueen, Geoff Manikin, R. James Purser, Xiujuan Su, Geoff DiMego, Dave Parrish, Runhua Yang, Annette

Gibbs

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Overview New variable (min/maxT)

Required by NBM project Variational quality control Implement URMA for Alaska URMA/RTMA precip enhancements

URMA is “analysis of record” for National Blend of Global Models project (part of Sandy Supplemental) and MUST be implemented by end of CY 2015! 2

Things ‘missing’ Expanded westward domain

Depends on RAP/HRRR upgrade to provide background Significant Wave Height

Obs not ready New ‘unified’ terrain from National Blend

Terrain does not match with MDL-provided land/sea mask Land/sea mask was not part of NBM project but is needed for

RTMA/URMA Upgrade can’t be pushed back because of NBM deadline

Ceiling height, GLERL method over Great Lakes, wind speed as a scalar, UrbaNet obs, automated reject lists, improved background for Guam

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Min/max Temperature NBM forecast variable Implementing for CONUS and Alaska

NBM needs CONUS now, other domains later MinT analyzed in 20Z URMA, MaxT in 08Z URMA (for all domains) Use NDFD time range (8P-7A and 7A-7P LOCAL time) Min/max ob ‘calculator’ provided by MDL (Bruce Veenhuis)

Same subroutine used to calculate min/max for MOS Uses 6-hourly (00/06/12/18Z) mins/maxes from METAR sites Adjusted to use hourly obs only when needed (eg mesonets)

Local time zone needed Time zone grids provided by MDL (Geoff Wagner)

Two serial jobs generate min/maxT obs and background during 07 and 19Z post-processing (wall time ~10 minutes)

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CONUS Time Zones

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Alaska Time Zones Int’l Date Line

Area west of date line reset to UTC -9 at request of Alaska Region (Gene Petrescu)

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Min/maxT Issues Time zone ‘dictionary’ fixed file needed to identify time zone for all

stations Will need to be updated to account for new sites (similar to old

QC lists) Mobile sites (ships, drifting buoys) must be left out

Missing hourly obs from mesonets Individual obs get into hourly analyses, but not min/max analysis

due to lack of data MaxT may be lower than max of hourly analyses sometimes (and

visa versa) First guess is max of guesses from the local time period (includes

bias correction) should help alleviate this

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Example MaxT Analysis

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Comparison: 22Z Temp (same day)

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MaxT Analysis for 12 Sep 2015 GES ANL

INC OBS

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Features of new nonlinear quality control Acknowledgment: Jim Purser’s scheme. Xiujuan Su developed the code for global gsi application. •

Right bottom panel: fit to a distribution function Observation type: Temperature from surface marine report (T_180) Black: Gaussian distribution; Red: new nonlinear QC; green: histogram of the innovation

Right bottom panel: fit to a distribution function Observation type: Temperature from surface MESONET (T_188) Black: Gaussian distribution; Red: new nonlinear QC; Green: histogram of the innovation

Features of new nonlinear quality control (continue) 2. When and how the varqc can help? In the case with large innovation at observation locations: (a) If there are a few isolated bad observation data, which exist often, new varqc assigns less weights to the bad data during analysis process; therefore, diminish the effect of the bad observation data . (b) If the data are of good quality, but the first guess are not trustful, those data information will be used in analysis and pull analysis close to the true status. With new varqc, we can relax the gross error criterion to let more data get into analysis. 3. Variables under new quality control Surface pressure, surface temperature and moisture, and wind components at 10 meter level.

Example: 02/19/2015 03z: an erroneous low temperature datum (MESONET) get into analysis

Product run shows a bull’s-eye With very cold value

T_new –T_prod: New nonlinear QC with tuned two parameters: The analysis values are much higher than that of the control run at the center.

case: an erroneous low dew point observation (at 46.37N, 111.51W) gets into analysis system (13Z 05/27/2015)

Td from the Prod system. A bull’s- eye at the station

Td difference: Parallel - product Td value is increased significantly.

TIME-OF-DAY AVERAGED CROSS-VALIDATION RMSE (12 day-period: 00Z 13 Aug 2015 - 00Z 25 Aug 2015)

pcpanl.v2.2.0 upgrade for RTMA/URMA 1. Stage IV mosaicking/precip URMA

For grid points inside of an RFC's domain, if input from that RFC is late or missing, we will no longer use neighboring RFCs' data to fill in (RFCs do not QC data outside of their domains proper)

Great Lakes are now covered by neighboring RFCs domains; WGRFC domain now extends to part of Mexico

Areas in the Gulf of Mexico and off the Atlantic Coast are filled in with data from the RFCs, as before

For hourly Stage IV, NWRFC and CNRFC input are excluded (NWRFC does not provide hourly input; CNRFC hourly QPE too dry)

2. Precipitation RTMA: Stage IV hourly is used as primary input for RTMA, supplemented by Stage II hourly

Additional info/link to parallel data online: http://www.emc.ncep.noaa.gov/mmb/ylin/pcpanl/

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RTMA example: hourly accum ending 17Z 27 Aug

prod RTMA

para RTMA

Current production RTMA: use early Stage II (from radar and gauge data received at NCEP by 33min past the top of the hour). Upcoming RTMA: use Stage IV (from regional QPEs sent by RFCs by 33min past the top of the hour), supplemented by early Stage II.

Stage IV: initial mosaic

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Verified against the CCPA, the parallel RTMAX has higher ETS and its bias is closer to 1.

RTMA vs. RTMAX, 27 Aug - 9 Sept

ETS

Bias=1

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Modified mosaicking/new domain mask for ST4/URMA

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● RFC domain area filled by that RFC’s data alone; use any available data for Gulf of Mexico/Atlantic

● Impose “missing data” mask off the Pacific Coast

● RFCs have started to cover the Great Lakes at the request of GLERL

● WGRFC domain extended to Part of Mexico

Education and Feedback RTMA overview presented to SOO’s via regional conference calls

earlier this year Examples sent in via listserv (aor-rtma@infolist.nws.noaa.gov) NBM VLab page (includes message board) NBM 4-panel Google Map viewer

Compare RTMA, URMA, guess, par vs ops, NDFDnow, LAPS Point/zoom, plot obs and QC marks Overlay roads, counties, cities, landmarks, etc.

Monthly conference calls

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Milestone (NCEP) Date Status

Initial coordination with SPA team 05/01/2015 →07/16 Completed 07/13

EMC testing complete/ EMC CCB approval 07/03/2015 →09/16

Final Code Delivered to NCO 07/10/2015 →09/16 →09/30

Technical Information Notice Issued 08/01/2015 →09/30 →

SPA begins prep work for 30 day test 07/13/2015 → 09/17 →

30-day evaluation begins 08/10/2015 → 10/19 →

30-day evaluation Ends 09/08/2015 → 11/17 →

IT Testing Ends 09/08/2015 → 11/01 →

Management Briefing 09/18/2015 → 12/2 →

Operational Implementation 09/22/2015 → 12/8 →

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Issues/Risks Issues: Risks: Mitigation:

Finances

Project Information and Highlights

Associated Costs: OST (NextGen) funded contractor, Sandy Supplemental Funding Sources: EMC Base: T2O 6 Man-months. NCO Base: 1 man-

months for implementation, 1 man-month annually for maintenance

Management Attention Required Potential Management Attention Needed On Target G v1.0 09/14//07

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Real Time Mesoscale Analysis and Un-Restricted Mesoscale Analysis v2.4.0 Upgrade

Project Status as of 06/12/2015

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Lead: Geoff DiMego, EMC and Steven Earle, NCO Scope: 1. Extend CONUS domain for RTMA+URMA westward to support OPC 2. Add NAM smartinit downscaling for westward extended CONUS domain 3. Improve depiction of channel flows in 10-m smartinit winds 4. Use Stage IV hourly as primary source of precip RTMA 5. Replace GFS first guess with GFS+HiResWindow blend for GUAM 6. Implement URMA systems for Alaska, Hawaii, Puerto Rico and Guam 7. Add a GLERL-type ob-adjustment & wind analysis for the Great-Lakes 8. Analyze min/max temperature 9. Analyze 10-m wind speed as a scalar variable 10. Analyze cloud ceiling height 11. Analyze significant wave height 12. Use new observation variational quality control within the GSI 13. Use EMC/GFE common topography and land/sea mask fields 14. Add automated monthly update of static accept and reject lists 15. Synchronize all RTMA/URMA applications to use the same code Expected Benefits:

1. Enhanced support for OPC and west coast WFOs 2. Improved along-channel wind analysis for Alaska & complex terrain 3. Improved wind analysis for the Great Lakes 4. Improved analysis for Guam 5. New NDFD parameters 6. More consistent forecast verification at WFOs with use of common EMC/GFE terrain 7. Eliminate need for periodic RFCs to update the static accept and reject lists

Resources 48% increase in node usage (from current total of 21 to 31 for all RTMAs and URMAs) 10% increase in IBM disk usage 5% increase in HPSS storage New URMA analysis and analysis uncertainty for Min/Max Temperature to be disseminated via AWIPS

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Ongoing Issues Need improved winds, especially over complex terrain Improved obs QC (time-series based) New variables Mesonet QC via SDM-reject list (currently in fixed file, can’t change

easily) Requires obsproc upgrade

Ob discrepancy issue WFO’s collect obs NCEP/MADIS does not Advise WFO’s to send these obs to CWOP where possible Forecaster’s favorite ob

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