[Datastream #KNX-863126]: noaaport/conduit decode (cont.)

["Unidata McIDAS Support" <support-mcidas@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi Kwan,

re:
> The reason I needed to specify such a short time span for surface data
> was because I wanted to time match surface data with radar images.  So
> this got me into the time matching troubles.  I think what happened
> was that what we normally call "00Z" surface data are actually METAR
> data taken at around 23:52Z.  McIDAS assigns this more precise time to
> the HMS variable, but it also assigns 0 to the TIME variable.

You are absolutely correct!

> However, McIDAS only has one variable for the date, i.e. DAY, and it
> is always in reference to TIME.  So the 23:52Z data would always be
> tagged with tomorrow's date.

Correct again!

> Ship and buoy data also have HMS and TIME variables.  But it appears
> that if any intermediate data exist, they are not assigned to the
> precise time.  Instead, they are assigned to the top of the hour, i.e.
> 23:30Z data would be assigned to HMS=23:00:00, TIME=23.

Hmm...  if this is correct, it would seem to be wrong.

> If I plot the
> data using PTDISP with HMS, I would get more than one station plot for
> those buoys that report more than once per hour.  I've attached an
> image of the plot.  Note the multiple station plots for the buoys on
> western Long Island Sound.

OK, I see what you mean.  I will have to investigate this one further...

Back on the issue of accessing the NEXRAD Level III composite images
for more than one day in a dataset that is not huge, like the ones on
adde.ucar.edu:

Try getting your NEXRCOMP images from stratus.al.noaa.gov.  The datasets
on stratus are setup to keep the most recent 'n' (where 'n' appears to be 128)
images available.  This is in contrast to the storage on adde.ucar.edu where
the the images are written into daily directories.

Cheers,

Tom
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Ticket Details
===================
Ticket ID: KNX-863126
Department: Support McIDAS
Priority: Normal
Status: Closed