Studying Snowmelt Levels with NASA’s B200 King Air | NASA Armstrong

Studying Snowmelt Levels with NASA’s B200 King Air | NASA Armstrong

More than 1 billion people rely on seasonal mountain snowmelt as a resource for their water supply and a team of NASA scientists and aircraft operators are measuring snow levels to better understand the contribution to our water resources.

In a series of two deployments in early February and March, pilots from NASA Armstrong Flight Research Center in Edwards Calif., flew the B200 King Air that was retrofitted with a specially designed radar developed by scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, to study new methods in measuring the snow levels.

The Signals of Opportunity Synthetic Aperture Radar (SoOpSAR) collects detailed data on the snow that melts from the mountainous region by utilizing radio signals in the environment to communicate information about the snow to scientists and how it contributes to the water supply.

 

Credit: NASA's Armstrong Flight Research Center (AFRC)

Duration: 1 minute 25 seconds

Release Date: March 29, 2023

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