oceanlove

   The land beneath the New York City area, including the borough of Queens, pictured here, is moving by fractions of inches each year. The motions are a legacy of the ice age and also due to human land usage. NASA/JPL-Caltech Scientists using space-based radar found that land in New York City is sinking at varying rates from human and natural factors. A few spots are rising.   Parts of the New York City metropolitan area are sinking and rising at different rates due to factors ranging from land-use practices to long-lost glaciers, scientists have found. While the elevation changes seem small – fractions of inches per year – they can enhance or diminish local flood risk linked to sea level rise.   The new study was published Wednesday in Science Advances by a team of researchers from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California and Rutgers University in New Jersey. The team analyzed upward and downward vertical land motion – also known as uplift an...

 ECMWF’s next model upgrade to provide better initial conditions for weather forecasts Cycle 48r1 of ECMWF’s Integrated Forecasting System (IFS), which is to become operational this summer, will include extensive changes to the way the initial conditions of weather forecasts are established. The new cycle will make better ’all-surface’ use of satellite microwave observations. The data obtained will be added to the many weather observations that help us to establish the initial conditions of weather forecasts through  data assimilation . The upgrade represents a significant improvement in the  use of satellite observations  at ECMWF. Other changes to the data assimilation system to be implemented in Cycle 48r1 include an increase in the resolution of the  4D-Var system  used for the atmosphere, and a move to a new software layer called OOPS (Object-Oriented Prediction System). ‘All-surface’ satellite observations The upgrade targets surface-sensitive microwa...