Contrails scanner
On clear or partly sunny days, people might look up at the sky and see straight lines of what appear to be clouds or white smoke. These lines are not smoke or natural clouds; they are contrails produced by aircraft. Contrails form because water vapor from jet engine exhaust passes through a cold and humid part of the air at high altitudes. Sometimes the jet that created the contrails is not visible overhead because winds aloft have blown the vapor trail into the observed area after the jet has passed. Naturally occurring high thin cirrus clouds do not form straight lines, they are more diffuse and irregular in shape than a contrail. Can an app be developed to help a ground observer determine the probability that an aircraft made the thin lines of white 'clouds' overhead?
Contrails may appear on clear or partly cloudy days because of jet engine exhaust that contains water vapor. The water vapor condenses at high altitudes where a layer of air is cold and contains moisture. The condensation is visible from the ground, appearing to look like pencil thin lines of 'cloud.' Altitudes where contrails can form from jet exhaust range from 25,000-35,000 ft, depending on the moisture content of the air layer. Our aim was to create a mobile app uses to distinguish between clouds and contrails. To do so, we used the observer location, to find the weather, humidity and the air traffic, which is related to that location, and by using this data we could decide whether there an opportunity for contrails to be created or not .
- Contrails education: http://science-edu.larc.nasa.gov/contrail-edu/
- USGS, 3D Maps: http://nationalmap.gov/
- FAA Air Traffic Control System Command System: http://www.fly.faa.gov/Products/acc_AIS_warn.html
- Other resources:
* Flight status or flight tracking information for major airlines: http://services.faa.gov/ - Contrail Tools: http://cloudsgate2.larc.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/site/website?c=contrails
- GLOBE clouds and contrail data: http://vis.globe.gov/clouds
