Advanced weather radar now installed at UNT

From left, Andrew Harris, vice president for finance and administration, and Randy Fite, director of facilities maintenance, at the Collaborative Adaptive Sensing of the Atmosphere radar installation at UNT's Discovery Park, this spring. (Photo by Jonathan Reynolds)A new advanced radar system at Discovery Park — UNT's 300-acre research campus — is allowing UNT to help provide severe weather data and warnings for the North Texas region.

The Collaborative Adaptive Sensing of the Atmosphere radar, part of a multi-sensor weather monitoring network in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, helps local emergency managers, National Weather Service forecasters and weather-sensitive industries by reducing injuries and costs associated with severe weather. The radar collects data faster and provides five to 10 times more detailed data than current systems.

UNT faculty will use the radar's data to research how the emerging technology can contribute to developments in emergency management, public administration, engineering and business. UNT emergency staff also will have access to the data for campus emergency preparedness.

The system was brought to the region as part of a project among several universities and governmental organizations, including the Engineering Research Center for Collaborative Adaptive Sensing of the Atmosphere, the National Weather Service Office of Science and Technology, and the North Central Texas Council of Governments.

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