Hi everyone! 

 

The on-line course that you will be doing on Wednesday starting at 10:30 am PST is:

http://www.meted.ucar.edu/mesoprim/hodograf/

 

Please do this in your own time after the daily weather discussion.  I found it useful to stop and repeat some of the sections which is why I opted that this be done on an individual basis vs together.  I will be available on the GoToMeeting Chatroom so that I can answer any questions that you may have. 

 

 

The point of this basic Hodograph course is to give an introduction to the hodograph and how it can be used.  I want you to take away just the following few points:

 

- that the primary use of the hodograph is to help visualize wind shear through the atmosphere

- what wind shear is and how it can effect the weather

- the difference between speed shear and directional shear

- some pattern recognition of hodograph shapes

- remember that backing winds in the upper levels = cold air advection and veering winds in the upper levels = warm air advection  (VWBC = Volkswagens in BC)

 

 

After the break, we will rejoin together on GoToMeeting to do some exercises.  Beforehand, please print yourself off at least 3 copies of a blank hodograph:

 

For our exercise together, I'd like you to plot the following 3 hodographs.  I will give you time to do this when we start the case study.  We will discuss what is happening with them together as a group afterward. 

 

 

I'd also like to go over some current sounding and hodograph data.  Here is the site that has current soundings along with the corresponding hodographs which really help visualize what is happening:  

http://weather.cod.edu/analysis/analysis.raob.html  (you can get the skew-t, text, and the hodo)

Unfortunately, it doesn't have many Canadian sites but we can use some of the American sites for the purpose of the exercise. 

 

I will send a message for the GoToMeeting.

 

Talk to you on Wednesday morning/afternoon! 

Terri

 

 

 

Terri Lang

Sector Development Meteorologist

Environment Canada

3140 University Way

Kelowna, BC V1V 1V9

phone: (250)491-1518

fax: (250)491-1506

Last modified: Tuesday, September 18, 2012, 8:38 AM