International Recognition of Observatory's Contribution to Aviation Meteorology

In July 2007, Mr. CM Shun attended the annual ICAO Asia/Pacific regional CNS/MET SG/11 meeting and chaired the part on aviation meteorology. The Observatory submitted a total of 8 papers, which was an all time high since our first participation at this meeting in 1997.

The Observatory's contributions on a wide range of aviation weather services continue to gain international recognition. In particular, the meeting paid tribute to the Observatory in setting up a dedicated webpage to monitor en-route significant weather (SIGMET) at ICAO's invitation. Through the assistance of the Singapore data exchange centre, all SIGMETs and advisories issued by the Tropical Cyclone Advisory Centres and Volcanic Ash Advisory Centres are forwarded to the Observatory to ensure availability of all data on the webpage. The meeting acknowledged that this webpage would facilitate the monitoring of SIGMETs. ICAO had issued state letters to the regional data banks, data exchange centres and meteorological watch offices to encourage them to send their subscriptions to the Observatory for access to the webpage so that the issuance of SIGMETs and the corresponding data exchange in the Asia/Pacific region could be effectively monitored.

At the meeting, the SIGMET posters prepared by the Observatory, again developed on ICAO's invitation, received positive feedback. The posters will be forwarded to ICAO and WMO for their final endorsement before distributing to all meteorological watch offices for their reference.

Apart from the above contributions in international matters, the Observatory also played an active role in the application of advanced technologies. In particular, the Observatory made use of the latest communication technology to conduct a trial to uplink integrated windshear alerts from the Hong Kong Terminal Doppler Weather Radar and the LIght Detection And Ranging (LIDAR) Windshear Alerting System (LIWAS) to the cockpit. Uplinking of the LIDAR windshear alerts to the cockpit is a world first. Representatives from the international pilot association (IFALPA) and the USA highly appreciated this development for enhancement of aviation safety.

Photo: Mr.C.M. Shun (left in the middle) chairing the ICAO meeting on aviation meteorology.

Webpage of SIGMET developed by the Observatory.