METR 2413 HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENT #4

DUE Wednesday February 11, 2004

This homework assignment is designed to familiarize you with radar technology.


1. What is the Doppler effect, who was it named after, and why?







2. What percentage of time does a radar spend transmitting, and what percentage of time does a radar spend ‘listening’?







3. If the reflectivity (Z) determined by a WSR-88D is 100,000 mm^6 m^-3, what is the reflectivity in terms of dBZ values?







4. Use the dBZ value computed in (3) to estimate the rainfall over a 2 hour period. If you were a forecaster for the National Weather Service, and the estimated rainfall that you computed fell in Norman over a 2-hour period, would you be worried? Why or why not?







5. What is the wavelength of the SMART-R mobile Doppler radar? Why is the wavelength (longer/shorter) on the SMART-R radar than the wavelength of the WSR-88D?