Feasibility study of seeing prediction using meso-NH meteorological model, 1997 (Final Report, pdf)

A 500m mesh Digital Elevation Model of a 120x120 km area around Paranal was built in 1997 to serve as an input to the MESO-NH mesoscale non-hydrostatic meteorological model developped by CNRM at Meteo-France Toulouse.

NUMERICAL

TERRAIN

MODEL

for

MESO-NH

NUMERICAL
TERRAIN
MODEL
close-up
Paranal
Lat: -24.6256
Lon: -70.4028
Alt: 2635.43 m

The meteorological fields used to initalize MESO-NH were the analyzes of the European Center for Medium Range Forecast (ECMWF) the accuracy of which was verified by CRS4 by comparison to the (WMO=85442) radiosoundings launched from the city of Antofagasta, 120km to the North. The scope of the work was to add to the output of MESO-NH a module able to depict the optical turbulence (credit: Elena Masciadri elena@astroscu.unam.mx) above the selected area and thus allow the calculation of the parameters relevant for astronomy, namely: seeing, isoplanatic angle, wavefront coherence time (see bibliography for details and performance)

MM5, a public domain model also gave promising results (credit: http://hokukea.soest.hawaii.edu/forecast/mko/ ) when compared to SCIDAR profiles recorded at Mauna Kea Observatory. It is currently used at ESO to understand the origin of bad seeing events in the Paranal area.

Bibliography
-P. Bougeault, Chen De Hui, B. Fleury, J. Laurent, Investigation of seeing by means of an atmospheric mesoscale numerical simulation , Appl. Opt., 34 No:18, 3481-3488, June 1995
-Masciadri, E.; Vernin, J.; Bougeault, P. 3D mapping of optical turbulence using an atmospheric numerical model. I. A useful tool for the ground-based astronomy, Astronomy and Astrophysics Supplement, v.137, p.185-202, May 1999
- Masciadri, E.; Vernin, J.; Bougeault, P. 3D numerical simulations of optical turbulence at the Roque de Los Muchachos Observatory using the atmospherical model Meso-Nh, Astronomy and Astrophysics, v.365, p.699-708, Jan. 2001