Numerical Wind Forecast at Mesoscale and Short Term for José Martí International Airport in Havana

Abstract At the “José Martí” International Airport in Havana (MUHA), the level of accuracy presented by wind direction forecasts is close to 70%, they do not meet the requirements established by the aeronautical regulations which effectiveness must be higher than 85%. Therefore, a numerical forecast of the wind field was implemented at mesoscale, in a short term, using the WRF-NMM and Consistent Mass models that are aimed to improve the forecast made by the Ogimet, a wind forecast numerical tool used in the MUHA. It was experimented with different interpolation methods; the best results were obtained on the natural neighbor with the correction of Consistent Mass model. A computational tool was developed which provided the numerical wind field forecasts for the MUHA corresponding to the 0000, 0600, 1200 and 1800 UTC which have a greater ability than the Ogimet and with an effectivity of 91% for numerical forecast of the wind field.