Proposed WWRP Project: Center for Monsoon Field Campaign Legacy Data Sets
1. Goal:
To establish a data center to archive data sets from past monsoon and tropical field campaigns and related data for monsoon research.
2. Description:
A major difficulty in tropical and monsoon research is the lack of routine conventional observations in the tropical and subtropical regions. For more than 30 years a number of important field experiments took place in which large amounts of resources were spent to make special or intensive observations over selected locations of interest. The data from these field campaigns have been invaluable as the main observation bases for advancing tropical and monsoon research in the last three decades. These data were created and used by various organizations and research groups and their storage status is quite varying. Researchers who wish to access these data often have to contact a variety of places to obtain the data. With the passing of time there is a danger that some of the data will be difficult to find.
The component of field program data sets that tends to have the greatest long-term value to the scientific community is the vertical profile represented by atmospheric sounding data. These observations are used most commonly for diagnostic studies and for the development of cloud parameterizations for weather and climate models. There is currently no central location for access of all research-quality sounding data from past monsoon and tropical field experiments. NCAR has holdings from some past experiments, but the collections are by no means complete.
The Monsoon and Mesoscale Dynamics Research Group at Colorado State University, U. S. A. has been maintaining data sets for nearly three decades from various monsoon and tropical field experiments. Specific field campaigns for which data exist at CSU include the following:
1974 GARP Atlantic Tropical Experiment (GATE)
1978 Winter Monsoon Experiment (WMONEX)
1992-93 Tropical Global Ocean Atmosphere Couple Ocean-Atmosphere Response Experiment (TOGA COARE)
1998 South China Sea Monsoon Experiment (SCSMEX)
2004 North American Monsoon Experiment (NAME)
2008 Terrain-influenced Monsoon Rainfall Experiment (TiMREX)
This proposal is to establish a Center for Monsoon Field Campaign Legacy Data Sets at Colorado State University as a WWRP project to continue collecting and archiving relevant field campaign data, and to supplement the collection with conventional radiosonde data from the monsoon regions. It is expected that the main efforts will be to collect data in the Asian-Australian monsoon region where most of the field experiments took place. These data will be catalogued and made available to researchers.
Work is underway in collaboration with NCAR to identify additional data sets from past field programs that should be archived and made accessible before they are lost forever.
In addition to ensuring the retention of the valuable past field data, the center will also make a concerted effort to collect radiosonde data from conventional observations that took place in and around the field projects. This will request the assistance of NMHSs in the monsoon regions. The GTS network transmits these data real time but often without a complete set of significant level data, which are crucial in determining the detailed structure of the atmospheric vertical profile that are necessary in many diagnostic and modeling research projects. It is hoped that the designation of the WWRP project will facilitate the data requests to various NMHSs in the monsoon regions.
Once established, thise WWRP data center will continue to provide the service of furnishing available field campaign data to researchers at the anticipated 100-200 requests per year to ensure that data will continue be available even though the time period for many of the experiments has long passed. The center will also arrange for permanent data centers to receive redundant copies of the data to ensure longevity of these important monsoon and tropical data sets for the long term.
3. Cooperation with other monsoon date centers
The Center for Monsoon Field Campaign Legacy Data Sets will collaborate with and maintain a link to other monsoon data centers. These include:
(1) The Monsoon Activity Center located in Delhi, India and managed by the Indian Meteorological Department. Dr. H. R. Hatwar, Additional Director General for Research, IMD, has confirmed the availability of the following data sets on 29 January 2009:
2002-2003 Arabian Sea Monsoon Experiment (ARMEX)
1999 Bay of Bengal Monsoon Experiment (BOBMEX)
1998 Global Energy and Water Cycle Experiment (GEWEX))
1979 Monsoon Experiment (MONEX-79)
1977 Indo-Soviet Monsoon Experiment (Monsoon-77)
1973 Indo-Soviet Monsoon Experiment (ISMEX-73)
(2) The proposed Monsoon Radar Meteorology Data Information Center at the Hydrospheric Atmospheric Research Center (HyARC), Nagoya University, Nagoya, Japan. Recommendation to establish this center was an important conclusion reached by the First Meeting of the Monsoon Panel Executive Committee and the Expert Team for Severe Monsoon Weather during the Fourth International Workshop on Monsoons in Beijing, October 2008. At the request of Professor C.P. Chang, Chair of the Monsoon Panel, a plan to establish this center is currently being prepared by Professor Hiroshi Uyeda, Director of HyARC.
(3) Other data sets maintained by WCRP activities such as the 2002-2003 South American Low Level Jet Experiment (SALLJEX).
34. Management
The proposed center will be headed by Professor Richard H. Johnson, Chairman, Department of Atmospheric Science, Colorado State University. Professor Johnson is a co-leader for the WWRP-TMR Monsoon Panel’s Expert Team on Severe Monsoon Weather.
The initial period for the center is proposed to be 2009-2014, during which period the center will be supported by Professor Johnson’s research project sponsored by National Science Foundation and the Department of Meteorology of the Colorado State University. The Center may continue at Colorado State University or be migrated to permanent national data centers such as National Center for Atmospheric Research.