New North Georgia weather radar fills coverage gap

A new weather radar system – a collaboration among three Georgia institutions of higher education - comes online at a critical time in hurricane season to protect people and property across the metro region and beyond:

Installed recently at Georgia Gwinnett College (GGC), an X-band weather radar purchased two years ago by the Georgia Institute of Technology and the University of Georgia (UGA) is now providing data for a section of north Georgia where information on severe storms such as tornados can be limited by terrain.

The radar will also be used for research into weather and severe storms, and by students at the three institutions for learning about everything from physics and engineering to weather, rainfall, and the effects of changing climate on the migration patterns of birds and insects. The instrument will be one of just a handful of weather radars operated by universities in the United States.

“We are really excited about this partnership with Georgia Tech, the Georgia Tech Research Institute, the University of Georgia, and Georgia Gwinnett College,” said Marshall Shepherd, Associate Dean for Research, Scholarship and Partnership at UGA’s Franklin College of Arts and Sciences and Director of UGA’s Atmospheric Sciences Program. “The radar will be a real-time component of classes, so it’s creating new instructional and service capabilities. It will also enable researchers at the University of Georgia and Georgia Tech to pursue new research opportunities in the areas of severe weather, frozen precipitation – and perhaps even studies of birds and insects.”

The radar will provide a new data source for UGA’s WeatherDawgs service, which provides hyperlocal weather data not only for the Athens community, but also for residents of eastern and northeastern Georgia. The system will also provide a real-time component for the mesoscale meteorology course taught at the university.

With Potential Tropical Cyclone #9, or the system expected to become Hurricane Helene, threatening the southeast later this week, this new, long-planned radar capacity arrives at an especially opportune moment. Congratulations to Dr. Shepherd, Dr. Neelam Khan of Georgia Gwinnett College, and John Trostel of Georgia Tech for their tireless efforts to bring this forecasting, research and instructional tool to fruition.

Watch a video on the new system.

Image: Radar returns from the X-band weather radar shows storms over Northeast Georgia. (Credit: John Trostel, GTRI)