Principle Investigator: Dr. Nolan Atkins
Where: Department of Atmospheric Sciences, Lyndon State College
When: 2-20 February 2015
Facility: Doppler on Wheels
Proposal: DOWNEWS 3 Proposal
Final Report: DOWNEWS 3 Final Report

Summary

Lyndon State College (LSC) with support from the Center for Severe Weather Research (CSWR) completed training, educational outreach, and five field deployment with DOW7 in late January and early February, 2015. This ended up being a very active winter period, and there were serendipitous field deployments lead by CSWR staff immediately before and after DOW7’s visit to Lyndon State to sample major east coast winter storms.

The principle educational objectives were focused on students in the junior-level Remote Sensing and Analysis and Forecasting courses. The intended learning outcomes were for the students to:

• be able to develop skillful localized weather forecasts around critical forecast parameters for planning DOW deployments,
• to scout, plan, and execute a DOW deployment strategy to sample local mesoscale phenomena,
• to operate the radar and control its scanning strategies as appropriate to the situation, and
• become more comfortable working in a team environment to accomplish a common goal under stressful situations.

There were a number of individuals who learned about the DOW and got the opportunity to see this awesome remote sensing platform. These included all of the ATM majors (approximately 100), a special event with regional high school science teachers (20), and visits to four schools, with approximately 325 student between grades K-12. The overall project was a great success, and a great way to engage our students in learning and keep enthusiasm high during an otherwise cold winter period.