20060110: McIDAS station table locations for non-NEXRAD sites (cont.)

>From:  "Salottolo Greg" <address@hidden>
>Organization:  NTSB
>Keywords:  200601101502.k0AF0j7u027285 McIDAS station database

Hi Greg,

First, I hope that your holiday season was fun!

re: NEXRAD stations are listed with 3-letter station IDs

>Thanks Tom. I understand now.

I believe the origins of this go back to the original listings of
NEXRAD stations/locations by the NWS where I the first listings used
3-letter station IDs.  I am pretty confident in this since I am the one
that modified McIDAS to support display of NEXRAD Level III images.

>However, greater precision in other locations would be useful.

I agree completely.

>Another question when do an imgdisp id=lwx does the command use radar
>coordinates dd:min:sec to locate the radar antenna?

Yes, it should.  IMGDISP parses the STAtion= keyword and then uses the
ID value in a STNDB.CORE, STNDB.SITE, and STNDB.USER lookup (with
STNDB.USER being the most significant; locations specified in it
override specifications in STNDB.SITE which, in turn, override
locations specified in STNDB.CORE).  The effect is the same as if one
uses STNLIST to get the location.

>Was there a time when the nexrad coordinates used by the imgdisp command
>only used dd:min?

Yes, there was a time when the NEXRAD locations were inaccurate and/or
incorrect.  This was brought to light by IDV users (probably you?) and
reported to SSEC.  The result was an updating of the STNDB.CORE with
correct and more precise NEXRAD locations.

>We have in the past noticed mcidas generated wx echo displays
>(from NEXRALL) that were displaced by a small distance (comparing
>with WATADS presentation).

You noticed this by locating the NEXRAD station on top of the
composite display?  If yes, then the previously inaccurate/bad
(some were totally incorrect) locations would make a significant
difference.

>I know we had a range ring location
>issue with IDV because of a lack of precision. That has been fixed.
>
>Thanks ..   

No worries.

Cheers,

Tom
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