On the ground, the storm research team will launch weather balloons and monitor land-based sensors to validate the high-altitude measurements taken by instruments aboard the planes.

The team plans to fly the NASA planes in conjunction with scheduled storm flights of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) that will take off from MacDill Air Force Base, Tampa, Fla., and the "Hurricane Hunters" - the U.S. Air Force's 53rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron from Keesler Air Force Base, Miss.

The Air Force's Hurricane Hunters and NOAA routinely fly into tropical storms and hurricanes to determine the location, motion, strength and size of the storm. The information that the two organizations gather is used to predict the potential strength and size of the storm as well as landfall.

In addition to providing Doppler radars on each research aircraft, NASA for the first time will bring state-of-the-art airborne instruments to measure moisture and wind fields around the hurricanes under observation.

NOAA flies a WP-3 Orion - a four engine turboprop aircraft - into storms at altitudes below 27,000 feet. And the Hurricane Hunters fly a WC-130 Hercules - a four-engine turboprop aircraft - at 5,000-10,000 feet.

"We will analyze the high-altitude storm information within the context of more traditional low-level aircraft observations, and satellite and ground-based radar observations," said Hood. "This new information should provide insight to hurricane modelers - forecasters who continually strive to improve hurricane predictions."

Scientific instruments provided by Marshall to be flown on the Dryden aircraft will be augmented by instruments from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md; Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.; Langley Research Center, Hampton, Va; and Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif.

The hurricane study is part of NASA's Earth Science enterprise to better understand the total Earth system and the effects of natural and human-induced changes to the global environment

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Responsible NASA Official: John Childress For questions, contact: Dryden Web Group Page Curator: Monroe Conner Modified:September 3, 1998