How Technologies Work Involved in Weather Forecasting

Increasingly, the weather has settled weather forecasts. Behind them there are many technological devices that assist in this field. Satellites, radar, weather balloons, computers and specialized agencies working to make this accurate measurement.

The Revoseek prepared an article explaining about the operation of the meteorological centers, showing which technologies help on this service and how does the process of information to reach homes.

Meteorology Centers

The main institutes forecast are the National Institute for Space Research (INPE) and the National Institute of Meteorology (INMET). They are government agencies responsible for analysis of weather and climate in the country.

The centers use as base data collected internationally as well as data gathered in USA. For this, they have the monitoring satellites and a network of space stations throughout the country to ensure the functioning of the service.

Satellites

GOES satellite image provided by showing the temperature at the cloud tops

Within minutes the weatherman can have an assessment of what happens in the atmosphere and thus make a prediction for the next hour.

These satellites are international agencies and provide the data to the centers that acquire a receiving station. The satellite of a U.S. agency, GOES, for example, positioned 36,000 km away is one of the most used to help in weather forecasting.

Weather stations

The station Observer Altitude or Radiosonde is a set of sensors that measure temperature, humidity and atmospheric pressure while being raised to a height of 30km by a balloon inflated with helium gas. Through a GPS antenna, measure the wind speed and direction, and these data are sent to the radio station that processes the data and generates a message to be delivered.

Another model of weather station is the Automatic Surface Observation. It is connected to a power sensor for evaluating the weather. They measure pressure, temperature, radiation, wind speed and direction. The information is computed every minute and transmitted to the institute every hour.

There is also the model of Conventional Surface. It is composed of isolated sensors that record the analysis parameters, which are read and recorded by a professional and sent to a central collector.

Errors in forecasts

Although fewer mistakes occur in weather forecasts, these errors happen mainly because of differences in the calculations supplied by various meteorological centers worldwide. Each center has a type of calculation, and, sometimes, different insertion of a determinant cause error in the final forecast. Another factor is called the “initial condition of observation,” it is made by a rounding and this small measurement error can lead to a larger error in the calculation.

The World Meteorological Organization, WMO, of which USA is a part, is the United Nations agency that helps prevent errors in predictions.It also promotes cooperation climate between member countries and agencies, facilitating information exchange, technology transfer and joint research.

The weather forecast helps in increasing precautionary disaster, assisting in the daily lives of people and helping to understand the workings of the planet. And the advance of technology is fundamental to the development of this science.

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Posted by Paracha on November 18, 2012. Filed under Articles, Innovation, Technology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.