gov.noaa.ncdc:C00617 National Climatic Data Center, NESDIS, NOAA, U.S. Department of Commerce Unknown tabular digital data http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/cab/igra/index.php Integrated Global Radiosonde Archive is a digital data set archived at the National Climatic Data Center (NCDC). This dataset contains monthly means of geopotential height, temperature, zonal wind, and meridional wind derived from the Integrated Global Radiosonde Archive (IGRA, DSI-6351). IGRA consists of radiosonde and pilot balloon observations at over 1500 globally distributed stations, and monthly means are available for the surface and mandatory levels at many of these stations. The period of record varies from station to station, with many extending from 1970 to present. Monthly means are computed separately for the nominal times of 0000 and 1200 UTC, considering data within two hours of each nominal time. A mean is provided, along with the number of values used to calculate it, whenever there are at least 10 values for a particular station, month, nominal time, and level. The monthly-mean files are updated on the fifth day of each month and are available online at no charge. To make a wide range of climatic data available to researchers and the public. Durre, I. Vose, R. S. Wuertz, D. B. 2006 Journal of Climate 19, 53-68 data set C00617 RADIOSONDES RADIOSONDES National Climatic Data Center, NESDIS, NOAA, U.S. Department of Commerce Durre, I., R. S. Vose, and D. B. Wuertz, 2006: Overview of the Integrated Global Radiosonde Archive. Journal of Climate, 19, 53-68. http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/cab/igra/index.php http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/cab/igra/index.php?name=visualization http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/cab/igra/index.php 19470101 Present Ground Condition In work As Needed -180.00 180.00 90.00 -90.00 ISO 19115 Topic Category climatologyMeteorologyAtmosphere 004 elevation 006 DIF Discipline Keyword Thesaurus Earth Sciences > Atmosphere > Meteorology Earth Sciences > Atmosphere > Climatology Earth Sciences > Atmosphere > Weather GCMD Sciences Keyword Valids EARTH SCIENCE > ATMOSPHERE > ATMOSPHERIC PRESSURE > ATMOSPHERIC PRESSURE MEASUREMENTS EARTH SCIENCE > ATMOSPHERE > ATMOSPHERIC PRESSURE > PRESSURE TENDENCY EARTH SCIENCE > ATMOSPHERE > ATMOSPHERIC PRESSURE > SURFACE PRESSURE EARTH SCIENCE > ATMOSPHERE > ALTITUDE > GEOPOTENTIAL HEIGHT EARTH SCIENCE > ATMOSPHERE > ALTITUDE > TROPOPAUSE EARTH SCIENCE > ATMOSPHERE > ATMOSPHERIC TEMPERATURE > AIR TEMPERATURE EARTH SCIENCE > ATMOSPHERE > ATMOSPHERIC TEMPERATURE > DEW POINT TEMPERATURE EARTH SCIENCE > ATMOSPHERE > ATMOSPHERIC TEMPERATURE > SURFACE AIR TEMPERATURE EARTH SCIENCE > ATMOSPHERE > ATMOSPHERIC TEMPERATURE > TEMPERATURE TENDENCY EARTH SCIENCE > ATMOSPHERE > ATMOSPHERIC WATER VAPOR > DEW POINT TEMPERATURE EARTH SCIENCE > ATMOSPHERE > ATMOSPHERIC WINDS > SURFACE WINDS EARTH SCIENCE > ATMOSPHERE > ATMOSPHERIC WINDS > WIND TENDENCY EARTH SCIENCE > ATMOSPHERE > ATMOSPHERIC WINDS > UPPER LEVEL WINDS EARTH SCIENCE > ATMOSPHERE > ATMOSPHERIC WINDS > WIND PROFILES GCMD Location Valids GLOBAL GCMD Location Valids STRATOSPHERE TROPOSPHERE RADIOSONDES RADIOSONDES 1 None None http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/cab/igra/index.php?name=visualization Provides visualization of IGRA data by station, and Creates maps of IGRA data for a user-specified time, pressure level and area. GIF Quality control procedures have been applied to the individual soundings from which the monthly means were computed. No additional quality control has been applied to the monthly means. The IGRA quality assurance system consists of a series of specialized algorithms that are applied successively. The procedures can be grouped into seven general categories: fundamental "sanity" checks, checks on the plausibility and temporal consistency of surface elevation, internal consistency checks, checks for the repetition of values, climatologically- based checks, checks on the vertical and temporal consistency of temperature, and data completeness checks (Durre et al. 2006). Each successive check makes a binary decision on the quality of a value, level, or sounding; either the data item passes the check and remains available, or it is identified as erroneous and thus set to missing. Although all variables are quality-assured, temperature, pressure, and geopotential height receive somewhat greater scrutiny than the other variables. Unknown The following data problems in the individual soundings might also be reflected in the monthly means and will be addressed at the time of future enhancements of IGRA: a. Geopotential heights prior to 1950 at some Russian stations were expressed in geometric meters rather than geopotential meters in the relevant source dataset (DSI-6310). b. At certain stations during certain months, wind speed may be incorrectly reported in knots or in hundredths of meters per second. For the most up-to-date information on the status of the dataset, see the status report at www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/igra/status.txt. Individual IGRA soundings are available in Integrated Global Radiosonde Archive DSI-6351 (C00616). Unknown Data are stored in files whose names contain the string 6352_VVVV_HHz, where VVVV = variable and HH = nominal hour. Possible values for VVVV are ghgt = geopotential height, temp = temperature, uwnd = zonal wind component, and vwnd = meridional wind component. Possible values for HH are 00 and 12. Each file contains data from all stations for one combination of variable and nominal hour during a specified period of time. Each record within a file contains the monthly mean for one station, year, and month. Fields are separated by single spaces. Note that the format stored in NCDC's archive uses a six-digit station number in which the first five digits correspond to the WMO number, and the last digit is zero, whereas the IGRA files available via FTP contain only the five-digit WMO station number. This documentation provides specifications for the archived format. For details on the FTP format, see the relevant readme file at www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/igra/readme.txt. _______________________________________________________________________ Position: 1-6 Element: STN NUM Definition: STATION NUMBER -- The station number is the five-digit WMO number with a "0" appended as the sixth digit. Range of values is 000000-999999. _______________________________________________________________________ Position: 8-11 Element: YEAR Definition: YEAR -- The year expressed at the nominal hour of observation (UTC). Range of values is 1947 through the current year processed. _______________________________________________________________________ Position: 13-14 Element: MONTH Definition: MONTH -- The month expressed at the Nominal hour of observation (UTC). Range of values is 01-12. _______________________________________________________________________ Position: 16-19 Element: LEVEL Definition: LEVEL -- Atmospheric pressure at the current level in hectopascals (millibars). The surface level is identified by 9999. Range of values is 9999, 1000, 925, 850, 700, 500, 400, 300, 250, 200, 150, 100, 70, 50, 30, 20, and 10. _______________________________________________________________________ Position: 21-25 Element: MEAN Definition: MEAN -- The average of all available observations for the identified element (specified in the filename), nominal hour (specified in the filename), month (specified in the record), and level (specified in the record). Means are given in units of meters for geopotential height, degrees C * 10 for temperature, and (m/s) * 10 for zonal and meridional wind. Range of values is -1000 to 70000 for geopotential height, -1200 to 700 for temperature, and -1500 to 1500 for zonal and meridional wind. _______________________________________________________________________ Position: 27-28 Element: NUM VALS Definition: NUM VALS -- Number of values used to compute the corresponding mean. Range of values is 10-31. None National Climatic Data Center, NESDIS, NOAA, U.S. Department of Commerce Customer Services Branch Mailing and physical

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Asheville North Carolina 28801-5001 USA 828-271-4800 828-271-4010 828-271-4876 ncdc.orders@noaa.gov 8:00 - 6:00 Eastern http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/about/ncdcordering.html DSI-6352 Every effort has been made to ensure that these data are accurate and reliable within the limits of current NOAA quality control procedures. NOAA can only certify that the data provided to its customers is an authentic copy of the records which were accepted for inclusion in NOAA archives. NOAA cannot assume liability for any damages caused by any errors or omissions in the data, nor as a result of the failure of the data to function on a particular system. NOAA makes no warranty, expressed or implied, nor does the fact of distribution constitute such a warranty. ASCII and GIF Files http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/cab/igra/index.php http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/cab/igra/index.php http Integrated Global Radiosonde Archive (IGRA) - Access Data from the Integrated Global Radiosonde Archive can be accessed using FTP and HTTP access methods. download Pricing is dependent on customer order specifications. Please contact NCDC for information on fees and terms for retreiving the Data Set or Product. 20060627 20060627 National Climatic Data Center, NESDIS, NOAA, U.S. Department of Commerce Customer Services Branch Mailing and physical

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Asheville North Carolina 28801-5001 USA 828-271-4800 828-271-4010 828-271-4876 ncdc.metadata@noaa.gov 8:00 - 6:00 Eastern Content Standard for Digital Geospatial Metadata: Extensions for Remote Sensing Metadata FGDC-STD-012-2002 http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/metadata/extensions/local_extensions.html NGDC Extensions to FGDC Metadata http://www.fgdc.gov/standards/projects/FGDC-standards-projects/csdgm_rs_ex/MetadataRemoteSensingExtens.pdf http://www.fgdc.gov/standards/projects/FGDC-standards-projects/csdgm_rs_ex/remote-sensing-metadata Content Standard for Digital Geospatial Metadata: Extensions for Remote Sensing Metadata, FGDC-STD-012-2002 http://www.eis.noaa.gov/fgdc/fgdcleg.html NOAA Supplemental Information in Description (NOAA legacy extension to FGDC)