High Altitude Meteorological Data - Rocket

High Altitude Meteorological Data is historical upper air data archived at the National Climatic Data Center (NCDC). It consists of a combination of publications and data forms starting in 1960. Initially, high altitude meteorological data reports were presented in a limited publication by the U.S. Army Electronics Research and Development Activity titles Data Report of the Meteorological Rocket Firings. These reports began in April 1960 with the data for the fall 1959 and winter 1960. Publications continued by season through the summer 1962 data, then monthly from September 1962 through March 1964. NCDC began publishing these data on a monthly basis in January 1964 and continued through December 1968. Starting with January 1969 data, the NCDC publication title was changed to High Altitude Meteorological Data, to accommodate all types of high altitude meteorological observations. The publication format was also changed at that time and it continued to be issued monthly through December 1972. Quarterly issues began in 1973 and continued as a formal publication through the October-November-December 1976 issue. The data of the publication contains global wind, temperature, pressure, density, and speed of sound data from dropsondes carried aloft by rockets. Data were generally collected from 90 to 20 kilometers above the earths surface and are presented in tabular and graphic forms. A supplementary summary and a period of record comparative data table (means and standard deviations) are also included for each station month. Participating stations were widely scattered throughout the world. Although data starting with January 1977 were not published, they were compiled in the same format as the 1976 publication, placed on microform, and placed in digital data set DSI-5850 (C00074). DSI-5850 is a current digital data set at NCDC and is the recommended source for digital rocketsonde data.