Improved atmospheric boundary layer observations of tropical cyclones with the Imaging Wind and Rain Airborne Profiler

Abstract

The Imaging Wind and Rain Arborne Profilers (IWRAP) is a dual-frequency, conically-scanning Doppler radar that measures high-resolution, dual-polarized, multi-beam C- and Ku-band reflectivity and Doppler velocity profiles of the atmospheric boundary layer (ABL) within the inner core of hurricanes. From the datasets acquired during the 2002 through 20O5 hurricane seasons as part of the ONR Coupled Boundary Layer Air-Sea Transfer (CBLAST) program and the NOAA/NESDIS Ocean Winds and Rain experiments, very high resolution radar observations of hurricanes have been acquired and made available to the CBLAST community. Of particular interest am the ABL wind fields and 3-D structures found within the inner core of hurricanes. As a result of these analysis, a limitation in the ability to retrieve the ABL wind field at very low altitudes was identified. This paper shows how this limitation has been removed and presents initial results demonstrating its new capabilities to derive the ABL wind field within the inner are of hurricanes to much lower altitudes than the ones the original system was capable of.