VORTEX Station Information 1.0 General Description The Verification of the Origins of Rotation in Tornadoes EXperiment (VORTEX) datasets contain data collected from approximately 200 hundred stations in the VORTEX domain (i.e., approximately 31N to 40N latitude and 91W to 107W longitude) for the period 01 April 1994 through 15 June 1994. The station information defines each station in the VORTEX data with station location, name, frequency of observation, etc. For a complete description of the station information file format, refer to Section 2.0. 2.0 Detailed Format Description The following is a complete description of the station information provided with the VORTEX data. The beginning and ending dates for the period of coverage are in Universal Time Coordinated (UTC), since all stations contained in the VORTEX data reported at UTC times. Note that when a particular parameter is unknown for a station, either a blank or a question mark will appear in that parameter's position. For a complete list of Country, State, and County values, refer to the documents referenced in Section 4.0. Possible identifier types, platform types and frequency values are listed in separate tables following the parameter descriptions. Note that only those identifier types and platform types present in the VORTEX data have been listed. Parameters Units (C Format) ---------- ---------------- Identification Number ID number in data. (unitless) ('%-15s '). Identification Type ID number type. (unitless) [See Table 1 below.] ('%4d ') Latitude Station Latitude in decimal degrees ('%10.5f '). Longitude Station Longitude in decimal degrees ('%11.5f '). Occurrence Station occurrence ('%3d ') Lat/Lon Accuracy Number of digits accuracy in lat/lon values. ('%5d ') Name Expanded station name ('%-47s') Commissioned Flag '(C)' indicates commissioned station, '(N)' indicates station which is NOT commissioned. ('%-3s ') Begin Period of Coverage Beginning UTC date of period of coverage. (YYYYMMDD) ('%-8s ') End Period of Coverage End UTC date of period of coverage. (YYYYMMDD) ('%-8s ') Country Country in which station is located. Always US for VORTEX. ('%-2s ') State State code. ('%-2s ') County County code. ('%-3s ') UTC offset Hour Offset from UTC time. ('%6.2f ') DST switch 'y' indicates station does switch to Daylight Savings Time. 'n' indicates station does not switch. ('%1c ') Platform type Collection Platform. [See Table 2 below.] ('%4d ') Frequency Frequency of data collection. [See Table 3 below.] ('%17s ') Elevation Station elevation (meters) ('%7.1 ') Fixed/Mobile flag Flag indicating if station has fixed location. 'f' indicates a fixed station. 'm' indicates a mobile station. ('%1c') Table 1 - Identification Types Identification Type Description -------------- ---------------- 7 National Weather Service Station Identifier 11 Oklahoma Mesoscale Mesonet Identifier 12 Mobile Cross-chain LORAN Atmospheric Sounding System (MCLASS) National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) Identifier 13 MCLASS National Severe Storms Lab (NSSL) Identifier 14 Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Clouds and Radiation Testbed (CART) Identifier 15 NCAR CLASS Identifier Table 2 - Platform Types Platform Type Description ------------- ----------- 40 Automated Surface Observing System. (ASOS) 41 Automated Weather Observing System (AWOS) 53 Cross-chain LORAN Atmospheric Sounding System (CLASS) 54 National Weather Service rawinsonde soundings. (NWS sonde) 109 Oklahoma Mesoscale Mesonet (OKMESO) 111 National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) Mobile Cross-chain LORAN Atmospheric Sounding System (CLASS). 112 National Severe Storms Lab Mobile CLASS Sonde. 113 Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Clouds and Radiation Testbed (CART) rawinsonde. Table 3 - Frequency Types Frequency Types --------------- < 1 second 1 second < 1 minute 1 minute 5 minute 6 minute 10 minute 15 minute 20 minute 30 minute 90 minute hourly 2 hourly 3 hourly 6 hourly 12 hourly criteria daily other no set schedule 2.1 Sample Data The following is a sample record from the station information file. Unlike this example, there are no carriage returns in the data. See section 2.0 for a detailed format description. 3KM 7 37.75000 -97.22000 0 2 Wichita (N) 19940401 19940615 US 20 ??? 0.00 n 40 5 minute 435.0 f 2.2 Data Remarks None. 3.0 Quality Control Processing Not applicable. 4.0 References Department of Commerce - National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), 1985: Federal Information Processing Standards Publication 10-3 Countries, Dependencies, & Areas of Special Sovereignty. Department of Commerce - NIST, Washington, DC. Department of Commerce - National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), 1985: Federal Information Processing Standards Publication 5-1. NIST, Washington, DC. Department of Commerce - National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), 1985: Federal Information Processing Standards Publication 6.-3. NIST, Washington, DC. World Meteorological Organization (WMO), 1988: Manual on Codes Volume I, Part B - Binary Codes. WMO, Geneva, Switzerland.