The Colorado Department of Transportation and Colorado State University recently launched a weather balloon to gather atmospheric data to help support maintenance and operations planning across all seasons for the agency – from winter storm response to summer weather events that affect travel on the state’s mountain corridors.
[Above photo by Colorado DOT]
The balloon, launched by graduate students from CSU’s Department of Atmospheric Science, collects readings from the surface to the upper atmosphere around jet-stream levels which includes temperature, dewpoint/humidity, wind speed and pressure at varying altitudes.
That data provides critical tactical information that feeds into the Colorado DOT forecasts that are used by the agency’s maintenance crews to make decisions about road treatment, equipment deployment, and traveler alerts.
“Understanding what is happening in the atmosphere above Colorado’s roads gives our crews a critical edge,” said Michael Chapman, Colorado DOT’s winter operations program manager and chief meteorologist, in a statement.
“This data helps us get ahead of storms in winter and anticipate severe weather in the summer, so we can make smarter decisions about when and where to deploy resources and give travelers better information before conditions change,” he added.
Colorado DOT noted that better atmospheric data means more precise, earlier action. Launching the balloon in conjunction with the monsoon system moving into Colorado this week also allows the agency to better predict potential flooding along vulnerable corridors, such as those surrounded by recent burn scars, which will then allow the agency to surge resources to potentially impacted roadways ahead of impacts.
The weather balloon-generated data will also contribute to CSU atmospheric research and will be shared with partner agencies including the National Weather Service, noted Brenda Dolan, a research scientist with the CSU team involved with the project.
“We are excited for this partnership that both benefits Colorado DOT operations and also provides us with useful observations for research and forecasting,” she explained.
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