UCAR/NCAR 2nd Annual visit to CW3E

October 12, 2018

For the second year in a row, CW3E had the pleasure of hosting visitors from NCAR and UCAR to discuss the development and implementation of West-WRF, which is the regional forecast model that CW3E is optimizing with a focus on extreme precipitation. The team from UCAR and NCAR included Bill Kuo, the Director of UCAR Community Programs, who helped lead the development of WRF, Chris Davis, the NCAR Associate Director of the Mesoscale and Microscale Meteorology (MMM) Laboratory, David Gill, computation expert, Jake Liu, data assimilation expert, and Wei Wang, modeling expert.

The two and half day visit began with technical meetings on near real time WRF modeling and data assimilation. The entire group convened on the morning of the second day. Marty Ralph, the CW3E Director, Bill Kuo, and Chris Davis began the large group meeting by discussing the collaborations that have developed since the meeting last year and providing context for this year’s meeting. Marty presented an update on CW3E which was then followed by presentations from the UCAR/NCAR group on research and program updates. After lunch there were more technical meetings on AR reconnaissance, WRF modeling best practices, hydrology, and the National Water Model. The day ended with Chris Davis giving a seminar on tropical cyclone wind structure and storm surge.

NCAR’s Chris Davis discussing tropical cyclone wind structure and storm surge.

The third and final day allowed for more technical one-on-one discussions on the efforts that are going on at both UCAR/NCAR and CW3E and how the centers can collaborate going forward. This included time for graduate students to inquire about research opportunities at NCAR/UCAR. The meeting built on the synergy that started last year with the visit and presented the groups with new opportunities for collaborations. The engagement and participation of UCAR and NCAR in supporting the technical development of one of its member institutions is greatly appreciated and we look forward to continuing this collaboration.