Space Science and Engineering Center

The UW-CIMSS SNAAP team researches and develops satellite-based nowcasting applications for improving aviation weather forecasting. Current areas of research focus on aviation hazards such as convection, turbulence, volcanic ash, and mesoscale winds. SNAAP is primarily supported by NASA and NOAA with direct contact to the end user community and decision support agencies such as FAA Product Development Teams, Volcanic Ash Advisory Centers (VAACs), NOAA/NESDIS, and EUMETSAT. The SNAAP also participates heavily in aviation weather sensor validation experiments (like the WVSS-II and TAMDAR water vapor sensors for example) and is conducting research on satellite-based nowcasting of high impact weather events (i.e. convective initiation) within the 0-1 hour nowcast time domain.