2009 Annual Report - NASA Airborne Science Program

Figure 16:
March 3, NASA P-3 Flight track from Goose Bay, Canada to the selected way
point in the Labrador Seas. At the waypoint, the P-3 performed High Winds ’09
“Star” pattern, Circle flights and Wing wags.
The five instruments being flown aboard the NASA
WFF P-3B were as follows:
• Passive Active L-band System (PALS) -
Steven Dinardo, NASA JPL
• Airborne Polarimetric Scatterometer
(PolSCAT) - Steven Dinardo, NASA JPL
• Airborne Expendable Conductivity
Temperature Depth Probe (AXCTD), Dr.
Daniel Jacob, NASA GSFC
• GNSS Instrument System for Multistatic
Occultation (GISMOS) – Dr. James
Garrison, Perdue University
• GPS Remote Sensing Instrument (GPSRS)
– Dr. Michael Grant, NASA Langley
Research Center
The High Winds ‘09 mission started with a flight
on February 12, flying over the National Data Buoy
Center Buoy 41002, off South Carolina to verify the
calibration of POLSCAT. Next, a region identified
for winter high winds is the Northern Atlantic
and Labrador Sea area. This location shows the
highest regional wind speeds as per current NASA
QuickSCAT satellite data.
On February 16, the aircraft was deployed to
Labrador seas to acquire data under high wind
conditions. The High-Winds’09 missions were flown
over a 3.5 week period (February 16- March 9, 2009),
deployed out of Goose Bay airport. Goose Bay is
a Canadian Forces Base (CFB) located in the town
of Happy Valley-Goose Bay, Newfoundland and
Labrador. CFB Goose Bay is presently operated as
an air force base by Canadian Forces Air Command
Figure 17:
Local Goose bay film crew, interviewing Steve Dinardo, about
the High-Winds’09 mission
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