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About this web site...
The Bureau of Meteorology launches weather balloon flights from locations all over Australia several times per day. This data is made available on the F160 chart, which is retrievable via NAIPS and from BoM's web site.The balloon data is also available from the Upper Air project at the Univerity of Wyoming's Department of Atmospheric Science. Peter Temple ran a service for many years which downloaded the Adelaide Airport data from UWYO's web site every morning and used it to construct aerological diagrams for South Australian glider pilots. Peter moved to the US in early 2001, and handed maintenance of his web site over to Mark Newton.
Until recently, the raw data behind the F160 chart has remained in the hands of the BoM. However, throughout 2001 and 2002, Daryl Mackay from WA has extensively lobbied the Bureau on behalf of Australian soaring pilots. After much painstaking negotiation, the Bureau has agreed to make the raw data available to this web site.
As a result, temperature trace information can now be made available to pilots all over Australia. To use the service you only need to know the location of the closest daily balloon launch site (usually airports in capital cities and regional centres). A map showing those locations is presented below (image credit: Australian Bureau of Meteorology. HTML image map by David Head). Click on the city closest to you for the latest sounding for that area:
How to...
Click Select Location... in the menu on the left, select the city closest to your gliding site from the popup menu, then click Next>>>.This facility will provide the most recent data available by default. If you wish to view historical data from our archives, uncheck the Obtain latest plot box before clicking Next>>>. You will then be given an opportunity to select the sample time/date you're intersted in.
Once this site knows your location, it'll also provide you with a Select Time/Date... button which you can use to choose an arbitrary sample.
Bookmarks
When you view a trace, a URL appears at the bottom of the display. That URL can be used to visit the latest temp trace for your selected location at any time in the future. The URL can be bookmarked for future reference if you wish.Another URL is supplied for the currently displayed temp trace. In future, you can always return to the time/date/location you have selected by visiting that URL. This can be useful for recording the conditions which were present during that memorable long-distance flight.
Printing
To obtain a printable version of an aerological diagram or predicted convection height diagram, just click on it. Your browser will then display a static web page without the menus, titlebars, and other extenuous information.
Site Maintenance
This site is owned, operated and maintained by Mark Newton.I welcome contributions from users of this site. In particular, each temp trace screen can be "localized" with information of interest to people in the area (for an example, see the Adelaide Airport trace, which contains links to local forecasts and gliding clubs). If you have any URLs for local gliding clubs, weather and climate data, information for visiting pilots, or anything else you feel might be useful, please email them to me for inclusion on this site. Be sure to supply the station name or number with your submissions.
