BAMOS Flashback
Terry Hart AMOS History Special Interest Group
BAMOS 2021 / 2022
Summer 19
Canberra bomber in RAAF livery . ( Copyright RAAF Museum 2010 )
altitude balloon over western Victoria to obtain a photograph from 85,000 feet .
Van Dijk and Rutherford concluded that the project “ had demonstrated the utility of satellite cloud photographs to identify synoptic processes from recognition of certain cloud types and patterns ”.
A follow-up study was conducted over an area centred on Woomera on 30 May 1962 and is described by Rutherford ( 1964 ). Again , an RAAF Canberra aircraft was made available and took time lapse images from altitudes between 35,000 and 47,500 feet . Photographs were also taken from a Weapons Research Establishment “ Long Tom ” rocket that reached about 130 km in altitude . Data from this range of platforms was compared with approximately collocated and coincident images from a TIROS IV satellite . The synoptic situation was the passage of a cold front over South Australia .
Rutherford noted the difficulties of exactly lining up the corresponding images from these diverse platforms . He was particularly interested in using these diverse images to compare the observations with classical models of cold fronts . As one result the satellite images showed an extension of the front further northwards than would be evident from conventional observations .
These pioneering initiatives were important in confirming the value of satellite imagery for synoptic analysis and forecasting . Australian scientists from a range of institutions continued to play an important role in the international effort that has seen the use of imagery and spectral data from satellites transform the practice and skill of weather forecasting globally , but over the southern hemisphere and Australia , in particular .
These reconnaissance missions with the Canberra aircraft were not the first occasions when the aircraft were used to study weather systems . In February 1960 a Canberra aircraft from the
Amberley base equipped for photo- reconnaissance flew over a tropical cyclone in the Coral Sea . Whittingham and Swan ( 1960 ) discuss the impact of the photographs from this first mission and the benefits for monitoring tropical cyclones . However , flights using Canberra aircraft to monitor tropical cyclones ended in 1964 . A detailed history of aircraft reconnaissance of tropical cyclone in the Australian region is given by Reade ( 2011 ).
As a footnote , in a personal memoir available from the Bureau of Meteorology Library , John Zillman records :
" In early 1963 , I was sent to Point Cook Air Force base near Melbourne to do decompression and ejection seat training with a view to flying as observer in RAAF Canberra bomber reconnaissance of tropical cyclones in the Coral Sea . I was extremely disappointed , then , when we didn ’ t get any big cyclones well out at sea that the RAAF at Amberley were prepared to fly ."
References
Gibbs , W . J . 1961 . Satellite cloud photographs in the Australian region . Aust . Met . Mag ., 32 , 18-25 .
Rutherford , G . T . 1961 . Review of the application of satellites to meteorology . Aust . Met . Mag ., 34 , 1-14 .
Rutherford , G . T . 1964 . A TIROS IV interpretation exercise over southern Australia . Aust . Met . Mag ., 46 , 1-16 .
van Dijk , M . H . and Rutherford , G . T . 1962 . A TIROS III cloud interpretation exercise . Aust . Met . Mag ., 39 , 1-27 .
Whittingham , H . E . and Swan , W . B . 1960 . The location of a tropical cyclone by aircraft reconnaissance . Aust . Met . Mag ., 39 , 1-27 .
Zillman , J . W . 2021 . Living with Weather and Climate : Memories of my Early Life and Professional Career . Memoir available from the Bureau of Meteorology Library .