The purpose of the Global Campaign Coordination and Communications Center is to serve as the main communications and coordination hub between the PIs and the aircraft in the field. It will resemble a small operations center. It is important to note that HIPPO will range across 8 time zones and the International Date Line during the 21 day deployment. This will require flexibility in schedules and support to meet the needs of the aircraft mission. The major task of the Coordination Center will be to accumulate and distribute up-to-date information on mission planning, operations, science and logistics, in particular:
- Aircraft status
- Instrumentation status, RAF, PI and user
- Weather products and predicted conditions
- Chemical model output products
- Real-time in-flight contact and coordination, as required
- General project logistics
A team of EOL staff and interested PIs will be in the Center to support all aspects of the HIPPO deployment. A group of people representing these components will gather on a daily basis in person or teleconference. These people will also be present in the Center or on call during aircraft operations to assist with any questions or issues from the aircraft. The representatives are:
- Brigitte Baeuerle, Vidal Salazar - Global Operations Center Coordinator
- Al Cooper - EOL Aircraft Scientific Lead
- Karen Rosenloff, Eric Ray (NOAA/ESRL) - Project forecasters
- Steve Wofsy (PI, will call in from remote locations when possible)
- Pavel Romashkin (Aircraft Ops PM, will call in from remote locations when possible)
- Vidal Salazar (Ground Ops PM, will call in from remote locations when possible)
- Greg Stossmeister (Field Catalog)
- Bob Olson or designee - Aircraft maintenance
- Kurt Zrubek or designee - Instrumentation
- Scotty McClain or designee - Pilot, help with flight planning, changes etc. if needed
- Chris Webster or designee - SE
- (Contact information for all science groups to report immediate instrument issues)
We plan to have a HIPPO Daily Status Update Meeting during the field phase beginning on 5 January 2009 through 28 January 2009. The timing of the meeting each day may be adjusted to allow attendance by the participants deployed with the aircraft. The purpose of the meeting is to ensure that all Center representatives and personnel deployed with the aircraft are aware of all happenings since the last meeting, and to share any updated information they may have received directly at the Center. In addition it is documented in the operations part of the Field Catalog.
The Daily Meeting will include:
- Aircraft status
- Instrumentation status
- Weather and Chemistry brief
- Plans and schedules for the next 24-48 hours
- Logistics update
The status meeting will start with aircraft and instrumentation status. This will allow the technical staff to participate and leave, or stay if they choose to. The following discussion of the chemical and weather forecasts is intended to be brief but can be flexible as needed.
All information contained in the Daily Meeting will be posted to the HIPPO Field Catalog or on the RAF HIPPO Web site. The catalog will be updated at least once a day following this meeting and more often as changing conditions or status warrant. This will help ensure that anyone can see the status of HIPPO operations and facilities from anywhere, assuming they have access to the Internet. This includes all interested science groups, groups traveling to the main support stations (i.e. Anchorage, AK, Christchurch, NZ and San Jose, CR) with information such as aircraft delays, or particular instrument problems that may require bringing a critical spare into the field to the next support location.
Time Conversion Chart
Below is a simple chart that shows all of the time zones we will visit during the upcoming HIPPO deployment. It includes a column of the 24 UTC time with conversions to all local time zones. Note that we will effectively range across 7 time zones and the International Date Line. Shown in red is the 'midnight' for UTC and local midnight for all local time zones.
