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Press Release No. 823

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WMO Members cooperate for Beijing 2008 weather forecasts

Geneva/Beijing (WMO), 5 August 2008 - Weather predictions and characterization of associated risk are critical to the Ceremonies and Games during the Beijing Olympics, beginning on August 8. For the third consecutive Games, the World Meteorological Organization is coordinating efforts by the host country and other Members of the Organization to provide timely and accurate weather information.

According to the China Meteorological Administration (CMA), Fengyun-3A satellite, which is the first of its new generation of polar-orbiting meteorological satellites, is expected to be in operation during the Beijing Olympics.

Fengyun-3A was launched on 27 May 2008 from Taiyuan satellite launch centre in Shanxi Province of China. The payload of this new generation spacecraft is comprised of a complex suite of instruments including visible and infrared imagers, infrared and microwave sounders, a microwave imager, an ultra-violet spectroradiometer and a space environment monitor. These instruments are designed to provide three-dimensional quantitative data in support of numerical weather prediction and environment monitoring.

Users around the world have already been able to freely access and use data from China's satellites, when Fengyun-1 and Fengyun-2 satellites were included in the WMO Global Observing System. China has committed to provide the direct read-out service of the Fengyun-3A satellite to all WMO Members.

The goal of the WMO Global Observing System is to meet the observation needs of all WMO programmes dealing with weather, climate, water and disaster prevention and mitigation, as well as WMO-supported initiatives such as the World Climate Research Programme and the Global Climate Observing System. It is a major contribution to the Global Earth Observation System of Systems. The polar-orbiting satellites, together with the geostationary satellites, constitute a core space-based component of the WMO Global Observing System.

During the Olympic Summer Games, the host nation and several WMO Members are utilizing these observations in a WMO-coordinated effort to deploy numerical forecast models specifically designed to improve prediction of high-impact weather in the vicinity of the Olympic venues on time-scales of minutes to days. One aspect is a focus on characterizing the changing uncertainty in such forecasts, which varies with the changing atmospheric conditions. The forecast systems include those already used worldwide by WMO Members for operational prediction as well as state-of-the-art systems from the research community. This coordinated forecast effort is a project under the WMO’s World Weather Research Programme called Beijing 08. Another component of Beijing 08 is to assess the performance of these models in terms of societal benefits realized during the Olympic Games with the goal of improving these models for subsequent forecast challenges and transitioning research results into operations.

WMO is the United Nations' authoritative voice on weather, climate and water
For more information please contact:

At WMO: Ms Carine Richard-Van Maele, Chief, Communications and Public Affairs, WMO. Tel.: +41 (0)22 730 83 15; cpa[at]wmo.int

Ms Gaëlle Sévenier Press officer, Communications and Public Affairs, WMO. Tel.: +41 (0)22 730 84 17; GSevenier[at]wmo.int

At CMA: Ms. LI Mingmei or Mr. XU Xianghua. E-mail: guoji[at]cma.gov.cn cc: lmm[at]cma.gov.cn Tel: +86 10 62172957 or 68406662. Fax: 0086 10 62174797

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