DEVELOPMENT OF METHODS TO DETERMINE WINDS, DENSITY, PRESSURE, AND TEMPERATURE FROM THE ROBIN FALLING BALLOON

The 'March 1965 ROBIN Program' written to obtain meteorological parameters from radar tracking data only is presented. The errors in the resulting data are derived and analyzed. A least square technique, evaluated by data from dual radar tracked flights, is used to smooth the coordinate data and, hence, to determine the most likely velocity and acceleration. The resulting meteorological data is found to be accurate within plus or minus 6 knots for winds at the high (60 km) altitude and plus or minus 3 knots for winds at the low (35 km)altitude. For density and temperature, accuracy is within 6% and 10%, respectively, for the high altitude and 3% and 14%, respectively, for the low altitude. Meteorological parameters from several flights found by the use of the computer program are discussed. (Author)