AIRBORNE DOPPLER RADAR FLIGHT EXPERIMENTS FOR THE DETECTION OF MICROBURSTS

In the interest of aviation safety, NASA and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) are jointly conducting research to determine the applicability of airborne, coherent Doppler radar techniques to detect early microburst in wind shear conditions during aircraft takeoff and landing. If early detection of these severe wind shear conditions can be demonstrated, avoidance maneuvers can be excercised and significantly reduce the probability of aircrft disaster. Researchers have developed a computer model of the radar which predicts its response when viewing a simulated microburst against the simulated clutter background of an airport, the so-called radar-microburst-ground clutter model. Studies employing this model revealed that Doppler radar can accurately detect microburst ahead of the aircraft in time for pilot evasive response, but flight experiments will be required for complete performance evaluation of the system.

• Supplemental Notes:
  • This article is from 'AGARD Conference Proceedings on High Resolution Air and Spaceborne Radar Held in the Hague, Netherlands on 8-12 May 1989', AD-A218 658, p35A-1 thru 35A-14.
• Corporate Authors:

  National Aeronautics and Space Administration

  Langley Research Center
  Hampton, VA  United States  23681
• Authors:
  • Blume, HJC
  • Lytle, C D
  • Jones, W R
  • Bracalente, E M
  • Britt, C L
• Publication Date: 1989-5

Media Info

• Pagination: 14 p.

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Airborne navigational aids; Aircraft; Aviation; Doppler navigation; Radar; Simulation; Wind
• Identifier Terms: U.S. Federal Aviation Administration; U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration
• Old TRIS Terms: Airborne radar; Doppler system; Radar applications
• Subject Areas: Aviation; Highways; Operations and Traffic Management; Safety and Human Factors; Vehicles and Equipment;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 00497062
• Record Type: Publication
• Source Agency: National Technical Information Service
• Files: TRIS
• Created Date: Sep 30 1990 12:00AM