Doppler on Wheels

Doppler on Wheels (or DOW) is a fleet of X-band radar trucks maintained by the Center for Severe Weather Research (CSWR) in Boulder, Colorado led by principal investigator Joshua Wurman, with the funding largely provided by the National Science Foundation (NSF). The DOW fleet and its associated Mobile Mesonet and Pod deployable weather stations are Lower Atmospheric Observing Facilities (LAOF) "National Facilities" supporting a wide variety NSF-sponsored research.

As of 2017, there are three operational DOWs of a total of eight constructed since 1995. All three are dual-polarization dual-frequency quick-scanning Doppler weather radars. Several instrumented mobile mesonet pickup trucks host in situ weather instrumentation on 3.5 metres (11 ft) masts to complement the remote sensing radars. These mobile mesonets also carry approximately 20 instrumented "PODS", which are ruggedized quickly deployable weather stations designed to survive inside tornadoes, tropical cyclones, and other adverse environments. The DOW fleet is sometimes accompanied by a Mobile Operations and Repair Center (MORC), a large van containing workstations for in-field coordination, data management, and equipment repair.

The DOW fleet has collected data in 200 tornadoes and inside the cores of 13 hurricanes. DOWs have been deployed to Europe twice, for the MAP and COPS field programs, and to Alaska twice for the JAWS-Juneau projects. DOWs have operated as high as 12,700 feet (3,900 m) on Bristol Head and at 10,000 feet (3,000 m) for the ASCII project at Battle Pass. Three DOWs, Mobile Mesonets and PODS were deployed for the OWLeS lake-effect snow study. The DOWs have participated in many field programs including: VORTEX, VORTEX2, COPS, MAP, ASCII, IHOP, SCMS, CASES, ROTATE, PAMREX, SNOWD-UNDER, FLATLAND, HERO, UIDOW, UNDEO.

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