Analysis of Candidate Communication Architectures for Automated Airborne Reporting of Weather Conditions

The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) is conducting communications architecture and modeling/simulation work in collaboration with the NASA Glenn Research Center (GRC) and supporting contractors. This work is focused on distribution from a system called the Tropospheric Airborne Meteorological Data Reporting (TAMDAR) system. TAMDAR is designed to improve forecasting by collecting weather data from regional and general aviation (GA) aircraft equipped with special sensors. This will provide higher resolution atmospheric data of the lower atmosphere, currently provided twice per day by weather balloons, which will be incorporated into existing forecast models for improved near term forecasting. This improved accuracy of near term weather products will allow pilots to operate more safely and efficiently, reducing the accident rate attributed to weather. A preliminary analysis of communications architectures and technologies to support near-term TAMDAR distribution is described in this paper.