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[IDD #ULJ-753965]: Retrieval of Upper Air Sounding Data

Hi Wade,

I apologize for the tardiness of this reply to your inquiry...

re:
> I'm hoping someone can point me in the right direction.
> 
> I'm a developer involved with VATSIM (http://vatsim.net - click on
> Member Services->About VATSIM).   VATSIM is a free service that allows
> simulator pilots and ATC to interact in a real-time environment.  All
> of our staff, operations and development is all-volunteer.

I have reviewed your website.  It looks interesting!

> VATSIM isn't reality, but it is more than a "game."  In addition to
> the many real-world pilots (both private and airline) and real-world
> ATC we have participating in the network as a training tool, we also
> have the MITRE corporation performing ATC-related research using
> VATSIM 
> (http://forums.vatsim.net/viewtopic.php?t=26017&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0
> ).
> 
> One thing we're always interested in is making the environment as
> realistic as possible.  We do a decent job with low-level weather by
> parsing METARs.  However, we don't have a good solution for upper-
> level wind.
> 
> What we're looking for is the twice-daily soundings for upper-air.  We
> could likely deal with receiving this data in a number of formats,
> though just text would be fine.  We'd be interested in getting data
> for all stations worldwide, twice per day.

> It appears to me that this
> data is probably available via UNIDATA and we would appear to be a
> valid consumer of the data under your guidelines.

We (Unidata Program Center/UCAR) are funded to support U.S. universities in
the acquisition and use of geo-scientific data.  We are not funded to support
non-educational institutions per se, but we do so when there is a quid pro
quo benefit to the Unidata community.

If you are looking for a realtime feed of the global upper air data that
is made available in our Internet Data Distribution (IDD) system, we can
possibly help locate a Unidata university who is participating in the IDD
who would be willing to feed you.  If you are interested in exploring this
approach, please let us know where you are physically located in the U.S.
(NB: I realize you have an international presence).

Another possibility is that you could put together your own NOAAPort data
ingest system and get the data that way.  This may be overkill if all
you are interested in is global sounding data.

> I've been scouring through the UNIDATA site, but while there's
> numerous references to the upper-air data, I have not been able to
> find a specific pointer to where it's available in text format.

We operate a THREDDS server through which the data can be accessed in
netCDF format.  One could then easily use the netCDF 'ncdump' utility
to list out the decoded data in ASCII format.

> Questions:
> 
> 1)  Who would I contact to find out if we are a valid consumer of the
>    data?

You wrote to the correct place.

> 2)  Is the sounding data available in a text format?

The raw data delivered in the IDD is textual in nature.  It is, however,
encoded in the normal way by observation systems around the world. In
order to use this data, you would need to decode it.

> 3)  Assuming the answers to #1 and #2 are yes, where can I get
> specifics on accessing the data.

Again, if you are interested in exploring a realtime IDD feed of the data,
we can ask our community members if anyone is interested in feeding you.
Please be aware that they may ask for something in return as feeding you
would likely cost them in some way (e.g., Internet bandwidth, support, etc.).

> Thanks so much for your help.

No worries.

Again, I apologize for the tardiness of this reply.

> Sincerely,
> 
> Wade Williams
> VATSIM-affiliated developer

Cheers,

Tom
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Ticket Details
===================
Ticket ID: ULJ-753965
Department: Support IDD
Priority: High
Status: Closed