DOHA: The multi-billion dollar Hamad International Airport (HIA) will have upgraded weather forecasting capabilities.
The state-of-the-art facilities will be installed under a major new project to be executed by Qatar Civil Aviation Authority (QCAA) in association with Qatar Meteorology Department (QMD), Qatar Datamation Systems (QDS), the winner of the project, said in a statement yesterday.
Information received from the new facility will also be used by citizens and industries in Qatar, including QCAA.
Well-known forecasting tools like SKIRON/Dust and WRF will be installed.
The high-resolution system RAMS/ICLAMS is expected to provide better predictions such as wind shear and fog for the new airport.
Wave and ocean forecasting systems such as WAM and MICOM will provide necessary marine predictions.
QCAA and Qatar Airways, along with Qatargas, Qatar Petroleum and other major industries in the country, are expected to benefit from accurate weather and environmental predictions.
Ahmed Abdulla, the Director of QMD, said this weather forecasting system is the first step towards a bigger activity related to marine and environmental forecasting, monitoring of seismic activities and other major environmental issues in the region.
In an open tender, 10 consortia from Europe, the US and Korea participated and presented interesting solutions.
The informatics company QDS, in collaboration with the Greek partnership of Innovative Technology Center SA (ITC) and University of Athens (UOA), were declared the winner.
The Peninsula
