Performance of five 915-MHz wind profilers and an associated automated quality control algorithm in an operational environment

The accuracy and availability of data from a network of 915-MHz boundary layer wind profilers operated by the U.S. Air Force on the Eastern Range are assessed using an automated quality control (QC) algorithm developed by the authors. The accuracy and reliability of the automated algorithm is assessed using the results of an extensive manual examination of the same data used for the assessment of the instruments. The details of the automated algorithm and the manual screening process are provided. Data were collected over a 647-day period from five profilers configured to produce one profile every 15 min, resulting in about 200 000 measurements. The results indicate that the instruments provide reliable, accurate data except when maintenance problems or heavy precipitation are present. Precipitation affected as much as 25% of the measurements in the dataset. The automated QC algorithm proved extremely effective in identifying unacceptable data. Only 0.03% of the data passing automated QC were identified as bad by manual review. While some valid data were identified as bad, the automated algorithm appears to provide exceptional performance for use in automated operational assimilation of boundary profiler data for model initialization and data visualization.