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Helping Business Weather the Storm

WDT and Foreflight Bring Ultra-High Quality Radar to Pilots in Canada

by Daphne Thompson, on Jul 27, 2010 3:43:26 AM

Best-Selling Aviation iPad and iPhone Application is First to Let Pilots Gather Preflight Weather Intelligence Based on Unique Radar Mosaic

Norman, OK. and Houston, TX - July 27, 2010 - Weather Decision Technologies, Inc. (WDT) and ForeFlight are announcing today the immediate availability of Canadian radar to ForeFlight Mobile 3 HD, a leading preflight intelligence and flight support app for student, private, commercial, business aviation, and military pilots.

ForeFlight Mobile 3 delivers zoomable, animated HD NEXRAD radar and satellite for the continental United States, Alasaka, Hawaii, and Puerto Rico – and now Canada. Beautiful, animated radar graphics with indicators for lightning, hail, mesocyclones, echo top height, and storm motion vectors offer pilots a sophisticated view of the weather in the U.S and in Canada.

"ForeFlight is delighted to offer our users in Canada the same, high quality radar data enjoyed by pilots south of the Canadian border,” said Tyson Weihs, Co-Founder of ForeFlight. "Canadian pilots have long desired the same high quality radar and satellite Slip Map capability available to pilots in the US and we’re excited to be the first company to bring airport level situational awareness to them," said Weihs.

"WDT is very proud of our new Canada radar mosaic, and very happy to be collaborating with ForeFlight as the first application developer to make use of our Canadian radar for mobile,” said Mike Eilts, President and CEO of WDT. “We invite any mobile, broadcasting, newspaper or media company serving Canada to test drive our superior Canada radar solution,” said Eilts.

WDT receives a raw radar data feed directly from Environment Canada, utilizes all 24 elevation angles from the thirty C-band Doppler radars and then blends the data with seventeen adjacent US radar sites immediately south of the Canadian border using its advanced radar processing system. The result is an ultra-high resolution, 1-kilometer seamless 3-dimensional mosaic display of radar over Canada, updated every ten minutes. Notably, the company has created 3D radar imagery providing complete coverage of the atmosphere from the ground up to 20 km MSL and has tailored the radar data to remove beam blockage, ensuring superior, highest quality radar for the entire country. The customized quality control package is not available from any other weather data provider, and has been developed to remove spurious echoes and mitigate significant terrain blockage issues that exist throughout the Canadian Rockies.

Specifically, WDT’s radar mosaic has the following characteristics:

  • 5-minute update frequency (10 minutes for Canada)
  • 1-km horizontal spatial resolution
  • 20-km vertical resolution of 3D mosaic
  • Provides composite and base reflectivity products

In addition to radar, ForeFlight Weather for Canada gives pilots smooth and efficient access to raw METARs and TAFs, translations, winds aloft, and satellite imagery. Pilots may search by airport identifier and view weather information for thousands of airports. Users can also add "Favorites" for frequent airports or view "Recents" to see their last searched airports. The application includes color coded indicators for current flight rules.

About ForeFlight

Founded in 2007, ForeFlight builds Preflight Intelligence apps for pilots. ForeFlight's critically acclaimed and highly-rated apps are used by thousands of pilots worldwide to efficiently gather the critical information they need to assess flight conditions, plan flights, obtain preflight weather briefings, and file flight plans with government aviation agencies.

About Weather Decision Technologies, Inc. (WDT)

Founded in 2000, Weather Decision Technologies has become a global leader in providing state-of-the-science weather detection, nowcasting, and forecasting systems and services to our partners and customers. WDT's iMap services provide dynamic, web-based and mobile interactive mapping solutions for the world's leading local media companies. WDT maintains operational and international offices in Washington, D.C.; Norman, Oklahoma, Atlanta, Georgia, and Austin, Texas.http://www.wdtinc.com

Topics:Company News

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