ice1972 Posted September 23, 2011 Share Posted September 23, 2011 Lookin funky near rio vista.....north of Antioch across the river.....funny looking return that's not moving....what is that? I texted my mom in Antioch to see if there was lightning to the north but she's says nah.....weird KMUX looks down so couldn't check if it was site specific.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chicago Storm Posted September 23, 2011 Share Posted September 23, 2011 Wind farm. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shiloh_Wind_Power_Plant Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ice1972 Posted September 23, 2011 Author Share Posted September 23, 2011 Wind farm. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shiloh_Wind_Power_Plant Weird....didn't know this....of course I know that wind farm well....you can see from pretty far away....so I went back to the radar and looked south of there and sure enough another return is showing up near the Altamont pass....longtime site for wind harvesting.....cool...thanks So what is the radar picking up? Blade motion? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OceanStWx Posted September 23, 2011 Share Posted September 23, 2011 Weird....didn't know this....of course I know that wind farm well....you can see from pretty far away....so I went back to the radar and looked south of there and sure enough another return is showing up near the Altamont pass....longtime site for wind harvesting.....cool...thanks So what is the radar picking up? Blade motion? While there might be some element of the number of targets reflecting back to the radar, a lot of what you see is turbulent air motion through the wind farm. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ice1972 Posted September 23, 2011 Author Share Posted September 23, 2011 While there might be some element of the number of targets reflecting back to the radar, a lot of what you see is turbulent air motion through the wind farm. Would that be similar to how a gust front out ahead of a thunderstorm shows up on radar too? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OceanStWx Posted September 23, 2011 Share Posted September 23, 2011 Would that be similar to how a gust front out ahead of a thunderstorm shows up on radar too? I was going to say it is sort of similar to that. However, a gust front can contain dust, bugs, etc. that act as reflectors too. A better example would be interstates. Many radar sites are located along major trucking routes (think I-80) and the turbulence created by the semis actually shows up quite easily on the reflectivity display. These are usually only a few pixels though, because there are far fewer trucks at one point in time than there are wind turbines. From my experience at DVN I can tell you this interstate feature is almost always present there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ice1972 Posted September 23, 2011 Author Share Posted September 23, 2011 I was going to say it is sort of similar to that. However, a gust front can contain dust, bugs, etc. that act as reflectors too. A better example would be interstates. Many radar sites are located along major trucking routes (think I-80) and the turbulence created by the semis actually shows up quite easily on the reflectivity display. These are usually only a few pixels though, because there are far fewer trucks at one point in time than there are wind turbines. From my experience at DVN I can tell you this interstate feature is almost always present there. Interesting....I-80 runs right by DAX....I went to school in Davis which is right next to it too....I went back and checked the return again and I swear there are little blips on I80, I5, and HWY 113....thanks....learn something new Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TimChgo9 Posted September 27, 2011 Share Posted September 27, 2011 Sometimes on the LOT radar, there is almost always a return right near the lake front when the radar is in "clear air mode". It's the return off of the down town skyscrapers. And, depending on conditions, the radar will pick up aircraft. It also gets the wind farms that are out SW of the city.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ice1972 Posted October 11, 2011 Author Share Posted October 11, 2011 Sometimes on the LOT radar, there is almost always a return right near the lake front when the radar is in "clear air mode". It's the return off of the down town skyscrapers. And, depending on conditions, the radar will pick up aircraft. It also gets the wind farms that are out SW of the city.... Yeah I checked lot radar and can see the wind farm to the sw.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.