Welcome

Welcome to the RTMA/URMA VLab community!

The purpose of this community is to facilitate feedback and discussion on the RTMA/URMA system. 

Meeting notes are available under the Google Drive Folder linked above.

To learn more about our next upgrade, see the asset publication below.

Use the System Overview to learn more about the system in general.

Use the forum to ask questions about the system and join the discussion with other users and the development team. 

Note that there are two forums: one for precipitation issues and one for all other variables.

You can post to the precip issues forum by sending an email to qpe.rtma.urma.feedback.vlab@noaa.gov.  For all other issues, you can post by sending an email to rtma.feedback.vlab@noaa.gov.  Please note that you must have a user account to post to the forum.  If you do not have an account, please contact matthew.t.morris@noaa.gov.

We recently added the ability for NWS Regional or WFO personnel to request that stations be removed from the analysis.  To access this, click on the "Station Reject Lists and Requests" tab.

There has been recent interest in knowing exact station locations, especially those of METAR sites.  Our METAR information table is under the "METAR Location Info" tab.

Users may also be interested in the National Blend of Models VLab community.

We appreciate any feedback on how this page or community could be improved.  You can submit such feedback via the above email handle or forum.

 

What's New

December 2017 Implementation Summary

Document

Overview of upgrade scheduled for December 2017. Note that this was originally scheduled for October 2017, but has been pushed back due to technical issues.

Forums

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KGPI METAR being thrown out?

RL
Ryan Leach, modified 3 Years ago.

KGPI METAR being thrown out?

Youngling Posts: 18 Join Date: 1/19/16 Recent Posts

I was looking over the URMA time series viewer and picked up the attached graphs for  Glacier Park International Air port.  For some reason the editor here won't let me embedd them in the message, but they're attached. You can see for both temperature and moisture the analysis strongly favors the first guess over the observations. I looked at several other sites in the region, and couldn't find any others that had this problem. I understand there is a gross error check, but I thought it was supposed to be pretty hard to lose a METAR to that.

 

Do we know what's causing GPI to be thrown out?

 

Also, I noticed that these graphics are no longer being updated.

 

Thanks,

MM
Matthew Morris, modified 3 Years ago.

RE: KGPI METAR being thrown out?

Youngling Posts: 158 Join Date: 12/6/17 Recent Posts
Hi Ryan,

Thanks for your email.  We will take a closer look at your question regarding KGPI and get back to you shortly.

The URMA time series page is run on the WCOSS development machine, which was unavailable beginning last Tuesday, March 16th for the GFSv16 implementation.  The machine was returned yesterday and the time series page is now updating again.

-Matt

On Tue, Mar 23, 2021 at 9:39 PM VLab Notifications <VLab.Notifications@noaa.gov> wrote:

I was looking over the URMA time series viewer and picked up the attached graphs for  Glacier Park International Air port.  For some reason the editor here won't let me embedd them in the message, but they're attached. You can see for both temperature and moisture the analysis strongly favors the first guess over the observations. I looked at several other sites in the region, and couldn't find any others that had this problem. I understand there is a gross error check, but I thought it was supposed to be pretty hard to lose a METAR to that.

 

Do we know what's causing GPI to be thrown out?

 

Also, I noticed that these graphics are no longer being updated.

 

Thanks,


--
Ryan Leach RTMA/URMA Discussion Group Virtual Lab Forum https://vlab.noaa.gov/web/715073/home/-/message_boards/view_message/14202451 VLab.Notifications@noaa.gov


Chris Gibson, modified 3 Years ago.

RE: KGPI METAR being thrown out?

Youngling Posts: 23 Join Date: 9/24/12 Recent Posts
Matt,  The KML files suggest KGPI is not being thrown out, but the correction is only about half way from the FG to the OB.  Less than we would expect for an ASOS.  There is one CWOP nearby.

Chris

On Wed, Mar 24, 2021 at 3:06 PM VLab Notifications <VLab.Notifications@noaa.gov> wrote:
Hi Ryan,

Thanks for your email.  We will take a closer look at your question regarding KGPI and get back to you shortly.

The URMA time series page is run on the WCOSS development machine, which was unavailable beginning last Tuesday, March 16th for the GFSv16 implementation.  The machine was returned yesterday and the time series page is now updating again.

-Matt

On Tue, Mar 23, 2021 at 9:39 PM VLab Notifications <VLab.Notifications@noaa.gov> wrote:

I was looking over the URMA time series viewer and picked up the attached graphs for  Glacier Park International Air port.  For some reason the editor here won't let me embedd them in the message, but they're attached. You can see for both temperature and moisture the analysis strongly favors the first guess over the observations. I looked at several other sites in the region, and couldn't find any others that had this problem. I understand there is a gross error check, but I thought it was supposed to be pretty hard to lose a METAR to that.

 

Do we know what's causing GPI to be thrown out?

 

Also, I noticed that these graphics are no longer being updated.

 

Thanks,


--
Ryan Leach RTMA/URMA Discussion Group Virtual Lab Forum https://vlab.noaa.gov/web/715073/home/-/message_boards/view_message/14202451 VLab.Notifications@noaa.gov



--
Matthew Morris RTMA/URMA Discussion Group Virtual Lab Forum http://vlab.noaa.gov/web/715073/home/-/message_boards/view_message/14214072 VLab.Notifications@noaa.gov


--
Chris Gibson
Science and Operations Officer
National Weather Service
Missoula, Montana
406-329-4840
MM
Matthew Morris, modified 3 Years ago.

RE: KGPI METAR being thrown out?

Youngling Posts: 158 Join Date: 12/6/17 Recent Posts
Hi Ryan and Chris,

The behavior in the temperature time series for KGPI appears to be due to the influence of neighboring observations and a colder model background in the vicinity of KGPI.  [Note that the observations from KGPI are being used in the analysis, as indicated by the KML files and the green dots on the URMA time series.]  Please see the following slide deck:


At 12Z on March 10th, the background is below 16F near KGPI, with warmer background temperatures coinciding with the cluster of observations to the south.  At 12Z on March 11th, the background temperatures are again a bit cooler near KGPI, but this appears to be a case of the analysis overshooting the observations as the final analysis is colder than the background and observations would suggest.  This behavior occurs occasionally due to the desired close fit of the analysis to observations, and results in the introduction of spurious increments.  We can flag the CWOP station immediately to the west of KGPI, but this may not have much of an influence in this particular case.

We expect a better fit to the observations in the upcoming 3D-RTMA system owing to a recalibrated model of background errors.  In particular, we note the use of shorter radii of influence for the observations and more degrees of freedom for the structure functions that determine how the influence of each observation is spread to nearby grid points.  We plan to make 3D-RTMA parallel output available to stakeholders in the coming months.  The initial implementation is expected in FY2023-24.

Please let us know if you have any further questions.

-Matt

On Wed, Mar 24, 2021 at 5:10 PM VLab Notifications <VLab.Notifications@noaa.gov> wrote:
Matt,  The KML files suggest KGPI is not being thrown out, but the correction is only about half way from the FG to the OB.  Less than we would expect for an ASOS.  There is one CWOP nearby.

Chris

On Wed, Mar 24, 2021 at 3:06 PM VLab Notifications <VLab.Notifications@noaa.gov> wrote:
Hi Ryan,

Thanks for your email.  We will take a closer look at your question regarding KGPI and get back to you shortly.

The URMA time series page is run on the WCOSS development machine, which was unavailable beginning last Tuesday, March 16th for the GFSv16 implementation.  The machine was returned yesterday and the time series page is now updating again.

-Matt

On Tue, Mar 23, 2021 at 9:39 PM VLab Notifications <VLab.Notifications@noaa.gov> wrote:

I was looking over the URMA time series viewer and picked up the attached graphs for  Glacier Park International Air port.  For some reason the editor here won't let me embedd them in the message, but they're attached. You can see for both temperature and moisture the analysis strongly favors the first guess over the observations. I looked at several other sites in the region, and couldn't find any others that had this problem. I understand there is a gross error check, but I thought it was supposed to be pretty hard to lose a METAR to that.

 

Do we know what's causing GPI to be thrown out?

 

Also, I noticed that these graphics are no longer being updated.

 

Thanks,


--
Ryan Leach RTMA/URMA Discussion Group Virtual Lab Forum https://vlab.noaa.gov/web/715073/home/-/message_boards/view_message/14202451 VLab.Notifications@noaa.gov



--
Matthew Morris RTMA/URMA Discussion Group Virtual Lab Forum http://vlab.noaa.gov/web/715073/home/-/message_boards/view_message/14214072 VLab.Notifications@noaa.gov


--
Chris Gibson
Science and Operations Officer
National Weather Service
Missoula, Montana
406-329-4840

--
Chris Gibson RTMA/URMA Discussion Group Virtual Lab Forum http://vlab.noaa.gov/web/715073/home/-/message_boards/view_message/14214151 VLab.Notifications@noaa.gov


Bookmarks

Bookmarks
  • 2011 RTMA Paper (Weather and Forecasting)

    The most recent peer-reviewed paper on the RTMA. Published in Weather and Forecasting in 2011.
    7 Visits
  • Public RTMA/URMA Viewer

    Another viewer of the current RTMA/URMA, with an archive going back 24 hours. This version is open to the public, but does not contain information about the (many) restricted obs used.
    52 Visits
  • RAP downscaling conference preprint (23rd IIPS)

    This link is to a presentation from the (then) RUC group on how the downscaling process works. Although we now use the RAP, HRRR, and NAM, the logic of the downscaling code is mostly unchanged from this point.
    2 Visits