Southern Airways Flight 242: The Role of Airborne Weather Radar

摘要

The transcript of the cockpit voice recorder tape from Southern Airways Flight 242 indicates that the flight crew, relying heavily on their on-board radar, observed what they thought was a 'hole' in the line of thunderstorms near Rome, Ga., on 4 April 1977. The analysis reported in this paper was conducted in an attempt to determine what the on-board radar display might have shown and how the crew might have interpreted it. There is of necessity considerable speculation in this matter because details of the configuration and operational status of the radar were unobtainable and because the National Weather Service radar at Athens, Ga., provided only limited information on the extent and intensity of precipitation west of the storm center. Nevertheless, the study illustrates the limitations of 3-cm (X-band) radar for severe weather detection and the need for current weather radar data to be communicated to aircraft in flight.