Wanted, an aircraft to study clouds

New Delhi, July 27: The Union earth sciences ministry has pencilled a proposal to acquire an aircraft to study clouds in an attempt to tackle gaps in weather prediction science that are handicapping current forecasts of rainfall and other weather phenomena.

The aircraft will carry instruments for the study of cloud formation and cloud microphysics and help supplement atmospheric data currently available through instruments on weather balloons, earth sciences secretary Shailesh Nayak said.

Weather scientists believe gaps in cloud physics need to be filled to improve the accuracy of monsoon and rainfall forecasts. Present-day computer simulations do not provide adequate representation of clouds. An improvement in the representation of clouds in simulations is expected to occur only through better data about the formation and behaviour of clouds, particularly during the monsoon.

“We’d like to have a dedicated aircraft for basic atmospheric research that will fly perhaps six to eight hours a day, 300 days a year,” Nayak said today on the sidelines of the foundation day of the earth sciences ministry.

But a document submitted by the earth sciences ministry to the Planning Commission outlining its plans between 2012 and 2017 cautions that India has a severe shortage of scientists engaged in cloud physics modelling.

“This lacuna must be rectified quickly,” the document said.

India’s weather science community has been chartering aircraft for atmospheric studies, but science administrators say they now favour a dedicated aircraft in anticipation of an increase in the frequency of weather observations in the coming years.

Many countries already have weather aircraft, including planes that can penetrate tropical cyclones to reach the eye of the storm. “The aircraft we would like to have initially will be capable of flying near the periphery of a cyclone,” Nayak said.