Rocket Man is Back

Now, a long time ago, I had this idea of something like a snail that would have one of those ESTES rockets with cameras in a steel tube that would fire up-ward into the center of a passing tornado.

But drones do seem to be better.

I wonder about something like the old Mogol balloon--where you have a balloon chain with drones interspersed along a vertical line between the balloons. Long/tall enough, it may intertwine with the tornado, allowing the whole funnel to be surrounded in a helix.

That would cost some money--but might be well worth it--to look at horizontal vortices, etc.
 
(Not referring to your post specifically Jeff)

Some of the scientists can correct me here, but I believe it's imperative to have calibrated instrumentation. This was always a problem with the show people, as I don't believe such unverified data using non-calibrated methods is "official" in a scientific world? Thanks.
 
As a side note Warren F; remember some university students in that documentary you were in - some twenty years ago - were shooting off rockets to trigger lightning strikes?
Little fuzzy on the details; but were those rockets getting the desired strikes via wire or vapor trails from the rocket - or both?
 
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Rob Wadsworth said:
As a side note Warren F; remember some university srudents in that documentary you were in - some twenty years ago - were shooting off rockets to trigger lightning strikes?
Little fuzzy on the details; but were those rockets getting the desired strikes via wire or vapor trails from the rocket - or both?
Click to expand...

I vaguely remember that. I was not connected with them as they were from a University in Florida if I remember right. They were using the rockets to trigger lightning in Florida for research?
 
I remember seeing this guy try to shoot rockets into a tornado maybe a few decades ago from a plane in a video. Heres some info:

books.google.com

The Tornado

Tornadoes occur in every state in the Union, and each region of the nation has its unique "tornado season." The most intense tornadoes can carry automobiles a half-mile and level a well built home. Some tornadoes have crossed mountains, seemingly unimpeded. Some have lasted more than an hour...
books.google.com
 
That was Sterling Colgate. He was a of Bernard Vonnegut's work.
Stirling Colgate Papers

Footage is in Grazulis' Tornado Video Classics

He is re-releasing his book
Home

Stephen Sponsler said:
No need to wonder, some information can be found here (as a starter) Lightning Research Laboratory (UF)
Click to expand...

That is Uman's bunch

I remember footage where one student was blowing air into a tube by mouth in order to fire a rocket.
Don’t Try This at Home: Making Lightning Bolts With Rockets
Rocket Triggered Lightning
RGP-Explore

More recent attempts
http://www.jasonrweingart.com/franklinstein#wild-weather-with-richard-hammond
 
I'd be surprised if they got much useful data out of that. You can't make quality thermometers and hygrometers that small. Also, how do you measure the wind? The damn thing is a rocket...self-propelled...aerodynamic...it's not going to measure winds with any semblance of accuracy. About the best thing they could do is make it act like a trajectory tracer after the engine cut-off, but if the thing got to 34,000 feet, then it is not in the tornado for sure.
 
Model rocket telemetry can be pretty precise with modern cheap accelerometers, GPS, barometer, etc. During and just after the burn you would have trouble distinguishing wind from propulsion, but then just assume everything after the first bit is wind. That's a pretty small rocket so if it went up to 34k almost all of that work would have been updraft. Probably broke a few FARs with that stunt though... at least it was a thunderstorm core where no plane should have been.
 
In point of fact an IC the size of a pencil eraser can make temperature, humidity, and pressure readings accurate within 1% of full range or better, with derived altitudes. Often much better. However, a rocket is not going to properly expose the sensor for that maximum accuracy.

Commercial GPS transceivers can get meter accuracy up to 50 Hz, so it is feasible in theory to get a 'debris' trajectory out of the rocket when he motor shuts off. What that tells you as for useful info? Couldn't say, and the way this particular 'research' team has always operated I am skeptical that instruments are well calibrated and well thought through. Things change though, and they certainly have passion and some potential background to do real work at some point. I'll reserve judgement to see the design summary and result set described in great detail in a peer reviewed white paper.

As for raw wind speed measurements? The only possible direct in-situ measurement method beyond the ~180MPH failure point of the most robust anemometers is using a pitot tube approach (problematic casing design that may not be deployable), or measuring at multiple ports positioned to be in the free stream static pressure (placed where friction effects and pressure coefficients are zero on the aerodynamic body) as with the HITPR probes Samaras deployed. Those probes had plenty of their own problems.

I won't say much, but having offered technical advice to one such project, I asked around, and what do most actual meteorologists/scientists say about getting single point data like the probes, or a rocket trajectory? "So what" seems to be what they say most often. There is a reason that multiple mesonets, airborn platforms, etc. are working in concert on one storm for official and well planned projects like Torus.
 
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