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Retirement (and the weather) have provided the opportunity to spend some quality time with the Windgrams and the underlying RASP model. With a little help from the RASP community, a new version of both is nearing completion.
The improvements:
– Much newer version of the underlying wrf software; goes from wrf 2.1 to wrf 3.6.1;
– Docker-based (though still running locally at the moment);
– Revised input data, both newer and higher resolution (land-use, green-fraction, upper and lower soil type, and elevation data);
– Revised Windgram software.
The only loss from these upgrades will be the smaller, windowed models offered in the RASP viewer. As far as I can tell these are rarely (never?) used as the RASP model seems to be primarily accessed for XC planning.
The Windgrams change quite a bit with this update. Here is an example from today’s Marshall diagram, along with an explanation (still showing the metric info). Nothing has been changed yet, so consider this an opportunity to comment.
Thank you,
Alan
I ran today’s (2/24) as there is a truck running and it should be flyable. There are some differences in the forecast:
– New windgrams are more optimistic about the top of lift
– New windgrams are more pessimistic about the wind direction and forecast stronger winds later in the day.
Today (3/6) for comparison we have:
– Old model data presented in old windgram format
– New model data presented in old windgram format
– New model data presented in new windgram (meteogram) format
All are from the same source data. I see only slight differences in the model predictions though the new model is (once again) more optimistic regarding altitudes…
Old Model, Old Format
New Model, Old Format
New model, new format
Same deal today (3/7):
– Old model, old format
– New model, old format
– New model, new format
I noticed there were some elements missing from yesterday’s new format version. Fixed that today. Same pattern as yesterday, not a lot of difference, but the new model predicts warmer temps and higher altitudes.
Old model, old format:
New model, old format:
New model, new format:
Here’s today (3/8) old model, old format and new model, new format. Mostly to show the new format’s handling of clouds and cloud cover %.
Old model, old format:
New model, new format:
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