Journalism of Courage
A special training workshop will be held for scientists of the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM),the nodal point for seasonal and extended range prediction for the Monsoon Mission,on the institute campus from April 11-15.
The Monsoon Mission has been launched by the Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES) with a major objective of enhancing the predictive skill of Indian Summer Monsoon rainfall in dynamical coupled models.The National Centre for Medium Range Prediction (NCMRWF) is the nodal point for short and medium range prediction.
There is a need for more accurate short,medium and long range monsoon forecasts and the monsoon mission is a step in that direction. IITM director B N Goswami said. Though academic circles in the country had carried out considerable research in the field of monsoon predictability,there had been no joint efforts from weather forecasters so far. There is an urgent need to bridge this gap and the Monsoon Mission will see a team from IITM interact with teams from the academia to bring out a modified,high quality weather forecasting model.
The workshop is being organised to familiarise scientists with the CFS modeling framework for the monsoon mission,which is expected to use a specific model and its components for further development. Scientists from Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES) institutes in India and National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP),US,will deliver lectures and provide hands-on training to participants of the workshop.
The IMD will actively participate in verifying the model performance and implementing the systems at IMD for operational purposes, said a senior advisor of the MoES. After a thorough inter-comparison exercise,we have selected the NCEP CFS model for the monsoon mission.
