Global Upper Air CARDS Synoptic Sort

Global Upper Air CARDS Synoptic Sort is digital data set DSI-6306, archived at the National Climatic Data Center (NCDC). It is meteorological upper air data. CARDS stands for Comprehensive Aerological Data Set. The goal of the CARDS project has been to produce global upper air data sets based on daily (up to four per day) radiosonde observations suitable for use in evaluating climate models and detecting tropospheric and stratospheric climate change. A major task of the CARDS project, which began in 1991, has been to build observational databases and make this data available to the research community and to NCDC customers. Data from over 27 sources has been collected, converted to a like format, and processed through the Comprehensive Hydrostatic Quality Control (CHQC). This data was then merged, based upon add/replace algorithms that took into consideration the number of mandatory and significant pressure levels and the number of errors detected during the CHQC, selecting the best observations from the available data sets. The data has then been further quality controlled via an advanced Complex Quality Control (CQC) system. The CARDS database contains some 27 million observations beginning in 1948, comprising a data set of approximately 64GB. A metadata record for each observation contains information related to the number of levels in total and by type, as well as a summary of the observation. A full suite of inventories and reports is available based upon the metadata. Building of future CARDS data sets will be based upon the detection and identification or removal of systematic errors (biases). Also, CARDS will provide an in-depth upper air station history for 2400+ stations. CARDS data includes the following purely meteorological parameters: clouds and obscuration, pressure, geopotential height, temperature, relative humidity, dew point depression, and wind speed and direction. CARDS data also includes a large number of technical specifications and quality control parameters. DSI-6306 is a quality controlled compilation of many upper air data sets. DSI-6306 is in synoptic order. The following is a partial list of the data sets that were used in the construction of DSI-6306. (These data sets should not be used separately; they contain original data as it was received at NCDC, prior to NCDC quality control.) DSI-Number Name FGDC Number DSI-6308 MIT Global Upper Air (CARDS) C00551 DSI-6309 NCAR-NMC Global Upper Air (CARDS) C00552 DSI-6310 Global Upper Air (from TDF-54) (CARDS) C00553 DSI-6311 Global Upper Air (from TDF-56) (CARDS) C00554 DSI-6314 USSR GTS Global Upper Air (CARDS) C00555 DSI-6315 Peoples Republic of China Upper Air (CARDS) C00556 DSI-6316 Argentina Upper Air (CARDS) C00557 DSI-6318 Hong Kong Upper Air (CARDS) C00558 DSI-6319 Republic of Korea Upper Air (CARDS) C00559 DSI-6320 Hungary Upper Air (CARDS) C00560 DSI-6321 Netherlands Upper Air (CARDS) C00561 DSI-6322 Australia GTS Upper Air (CARDS) C00562 DSI-6323 Australia Upper Air Thermo/Winds Merged (CARDS) C00563 DSI-6324 Brazil Upper Air (CARDS) C00564 DSI-6325 USSR Upper Air (CARDS) C00565 DSI-6326 Global Upper Air (from TDF-5683) (CARDS) C00566 DSI-6355 Russian Ice Island Upper Air (CARDS) C00567 DSI-6380 Global Aircraft Reports (CARDS) C00568 MIT = Massachusetts Institute of Technology NCAR = National Center for Atmospheric Research NMC = old National Meteorological Center, now National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) GTS = Global Telecommunications System TDF = Tape Deck Format USSR = old Union of Soviet Socialist Republics The names of the data sets indicate their source and where observations were taken. For example, DSI-6324 is Brazilian data received from Brazil; DSI-6314 USSR GTS Global Upper Air was received from the old USSR, who received it over GTS, and it is global data. NCDC maintains this data set in archive but no longer updates nor actively distributes it. It has been superseded by the Integrated Global Radiosonde Archive (IGRA) (C00616).