Collaborative Adaptive Sensing of the Atmosphere (CASA WX) Presented by Juan Ortiz, Emergency Management Coordinator, Fire February 9, 2016

Began as NSF grant These are the CASA partner universities Began as a regional project – 4 radars, when they said they were coming to DFW 4 more donated (8 total)

CASA WX Executive Council Fort Worth Addison Midlothian Mesquite Grapevine McKinney Collin County Johnson County Tarrant County National Weather Service DFW Airport Local Broadcast Meteorologists University of Texas Arlington University of North Texas North Central Texas Council of Governments These are a few of the CASA WX Executive Council member cities. Regional project Region worked together to secure funding for radar installation Membership program created to have access to CASA website with radar data and other products Region working together to secure funding to operate radars and acquire additional radars for the network

Collaborative Adaptive Sensing of the Atmosphere (CASA WX) Gap with NEXRAD – these are low level radars Higher resolution Faster updating 1 min vs 5 min Like having rain gauge every 800 feet Will provide more precise warnings from NWS to assist with our notifications to save lives and protect property

Benefits of low-level, fine-scale weather information Actual CASA WX Data from the Midlothian radar on Dec 26, 2015. Much higher resolution, can see tornado in black box NEXRAD Data CASA Data Comparison – Ovilla, December 26, 2015

Runoff – how much does rainfall run off? CASA Rainfall Runoff – how much does rainfall run off? Return period – How often does this magnitude of streamflow occur historically? Stream-flow- How does the runoff fill the streams and channels? UTA is doing research with Fort Worth Stormwater using the CASA data.

Fort Worth Radar site

CHANGE MESQUITE TO RED Fort Worth Radar site – Installed November 2015 – should be online by Spring 2016 Mesquite will be installed in March 2016 8

Goal is to have around 15-16 radars to cover the entire 16 County NCTCOG region Ultimate goal is to enlarge the network to include counties outside our region.

Questions/Comments/Conclusion