Jan 7 1979
From The Space Library
The New York Times reported that a huge international scientific project supported by 147 nations would begin this week. The $500 million Global Weather Experiment (GWE), part of the Global Atmospheric Research Program (GARP), would be a joint effort of the World Meteorological Organization and the International Council of Scientific Unions, financed by the meteorological group. It would expand the existing World Weather Watch, now generating more than 40,000 daily observations, by using 10 satellites, 50 research vessels, 110 aircraft, 300 high-altitude constant-level balloons, and 300 instrumented ocean buoys, in addition to other measuring devices.
The widely dispersed instruments and large numbers of scientists would study seasonal weather cycles in Earth's atmosphere and would gauge the practical limits of present technology for weather forecasting, to compile what would be the most complete record of global weather data ever attempted.
Twice daily, about 50 oceanographic research ships from 22 nations would release balloon-borne packages for atmosphere measurements; U.S. researchers would release 150 balloons in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans to monitor winds and temperatures at an altitude of 47,000 feet. Satellites would record wind forces and directions by photographing changes in cloud shapes and positions; they and other spacecraft would record atmospheric temperature and humidity as well as ocean rainfall and sea surface temperatures.
The head of the U.S. team, Rex Fleming of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), said that the belt of tropical oceans around Earth's equator was an enormous heat sink absorbing solar energy and creating much of the world's weather and that observations there were meager. "This will be the first time that an annual record of weather data will have been taken over the whole world," Fleming said. "The world can't afford to do this every year, but we hope from all this to design a weather-observance system that the world can afford." U.S. organizations besides NOAA taking part in the GWE would include the Departments of Commerce (DOC), Defense (DOD), Energy (DOE), Interior, State, and Transportation (DOT); the National Center for Atmospheric Research; NASA; the National Science Foundation (NSF); Defense Nuclear Agency; the Air Force, Army, Navy, and Coast Guard; and many academic institutions. (NY Times, Jan 7/79, 1)
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