The Meteor 60DX radar is ready to travel to Paris

by Rosa Vicari / École des Ponts ParisTech

From 21^th to 23^rd of May, a factory test of the future French radar was performed by the ENPC team, with the assistance of Prof. V. Chandrasekar (CSU Fort-Collins, CO, USA  & CASA Deputy Director for Research) in Neuss, Germany. 

The aim of the test was to map the radar specification features and to evaluate if they are useful for highly accurate observation of rainfall distribution in space and time. The test was successful: some final improvements will be made by Selex, the radar manufacturer, but there won't be delays in the delivery schedule.

Two weeks later, on 5^th of June, another important meeting concerning the future French X-band radar took place in Paris-Est Campus : a consultation meeting with the CHSCT of UPEM (University Paris-Est Marne-la-Vallée), one of the five commissions representing the users of the building where the radar will be installed. Several questions raised among the participants, mostly about the innovations brought by the RainGain project but also about the radar frequencies impact on workers' health.

Daniel Schertzer (École des Ponts ParisTech) illustrated what is the intensity of X-band radar frequencies and that these frequencies won't directly hit any building because of the location of the device (10 meters above the roof of Bienvenüe building). Furthermore, he highlighted that controls will be performed to make sure that security regulation is respected.