EAS 380 Fall 2009: Assignment 2 METAR Decoding

Due Thursday, September 3 at the start of class

Class Policy: All written assignments should be typed and use proper spelling and English.

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Use the surface observations from about 12Z on August 26, 2009 to answer the following questions. When asked for a station, give the city, state, (and airport if more than one) and the date and time of the observation.

1a. Decode the station, time, visibility, and current weather of the station having the lowest visibility.

1b. Decode the station, time, wind direction, wind speed, and current weather of the station having the highest sustained wind speed.

2a. Decode the station, time of the report, 1-hour rainfall, and the current weather of the station reporting the heaviest rainfall in the past hour or less.

2b. Decode the station, time of the report, 6-hour rainfall, and the current weather of the station reporting the heaviest rainfall in the past 6 hours.

2c. Decode the station, time of the report, 24-hour rainfall, and the current weather of the station reporting the heaviest rainfall in the past 24 hours.

3. What station experienced the greatest three-hour pressure change? Name the station, the time of the observation and the pressure tendency.

4. Is there any report that you can be sure that the sky is clear? Where is the station and at what time?

5. Decode all of the information in the 1155Z observation for KCKC.

6. Decode all of the information in the 1155Z observation for KMKT.

7. Decode all of the information in the 1154Z observation for KRRT.

8. Shade the area of rainfall described by the 12Z observations in Minnesota. Use the blank map from Assignment 1.

Use the list of METAR observations from KAXN to answer questions 9-11:

9. What was the warmest temperature recorded during the time period? When was it reported?

10. What was the overnight low temperature (00Z-12Z) for the night of August 16? When was it recorded?

11. What was the highest dew point temperature? When was it recorded?

Use the information from KPEX to answer questions 12-13:
12. How much rain fell at KPEX during this period? When was the heaviest rate of rainfall? What was the heaviest rate of rainfall?

13a. Plot on a standard graph the altimeter setting (converted to mb). The graph should like the sample graph:

• Altimeter setting is plotted in mb on the vertical axis
• Time is plotted on the horizontal axis in whole hours Z
• Each point should have a dot
• Each point should be connected with straight line segments
  • Note: The hourly observations are at a few minutes before the hour, so they are not plotted right on the axis with the hourly value.

b. What other changes are associated with each peak and valley of the pressure trace?

Last Updated: Wednesday, September 2, 2009 8:54 AM

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