Latest / The Captains Council Podcast / Inundaciones en Santo Domingo y falta de uso de los nuevos radares meteorológicos
Transcript
- John Morales, he that Dominican government has invested millions of dollars in meteorological that could detect those concentrated cloud-like and the rate of rain they are producing. Capt. Francisco Díaz: Good evening friends and welcome to the Captain's Council Podcast. Today we something new. Given the situation in the Dominican with the floods yesterday, Wednesday, April 8th, we have decided to this last minute to talk about a topic that we have been following for a time, the meteorological in the Dominican Well, with this triangulation, company Viasala also offered to use a software that I think is called Iris that helps create a three-dimensional with the triangulation of these radars. So the idea is that what one sees in the final is the sum. But when these convective are the that really bring these surprises, the meteorological detect these convective They see the rate of rain they are producing. Capt. Francisco Díaz: of the three radars, so it would be a much more complete image. the radars were bought, I think in the 22 by ELIDAC, the last two radars, and they were installed. Last year, in 2025, the one Puerto Plata and recently, about two months ago, the from Las Americas Interestingly, the one from Puerto Plata We say something new because it's first time we're a podcast without guests. I'll the only one. So let's get started. The board of captains has been following this topic since 2022, almost since the foundation of the organization. see if they are moving or not. Because if they are moving, means it is raining continuously in the same place and causing a terrible flood. If we are monitoring those radars continuously, should facilitate providing an additional In short, an alert that maybe Indomet Capt. Francisco Díaz: because it a subject that directly civil you know, need have weather information for the making of many decisions for the safe Therefore, this subject began to my attention in the Dominican Republic as I began to get involved little with aviation there in our country. I began to or we began to observe, the team began to observe was in Loma Isabel de Torres. We don't know. It's a radar that is from the It's radar that should be in the airport, Gregorio Luperon from Puerto Plata, but it was in Loma Isabel de Torres. At that moment, we began to notice something that caught our attention from the government. In an interview with Roberto Cavada, emits a special bulletin indicating that rain in the forecast, but the is indicating that the rate of rain is excessive. This should lead to sudden flooding and therefore we are issuing additional warnings and Capt. Francisco Díaz: and of planes that came mainly from Europe, already on arrival to the Dominican We Minister Jose Paliza and the director of the IDAAC, Igor Rodriguez, talking about how to use these radars for things that were not related to aviation. Things like agriculture, Indomed, the COE, and everything else. is true that radars can be used for that, but that is not its main El especialista recordó que estos tres radares están ubicados en Puerto Plata, La Altagracia y otro cerca del Distrito Nacional, aquí donde más llovió. Capt. Francisco Díaz: and they had to enter in long approximations and everything else due to the in the country. And we that there was little help from the Dominican Traffic and that basically these planes had to their own For that reason they were not manufactured. That is not what they through the As I before, industries or these needs are on different parts of the meteorology. These are radar radars for aeronautical Hopefully they put this radar on the hill of Isabel de Torre because of that. But it's where it should be. It should be at the airport. And the other thing we saw, the model they installed in This is very common in small developed and in large where air is still somewhat delayed. Ideally, air traffic control helps you identify where the storms what is the extension and what are the ways to enter or exit specific due to these storms. In Punta Cana, as we said, it a WRM200 from Viasala. But the Puerto Plata and the Las Americas is a different from the same company and it a WRS300. It is a more modern it is called solid and it has a range. But it is still a local It is still a radar for the province or for the northern part of the island. So we that lack in the Dominican and when we started to investigate, we found out that there was one radar in the whole country, meteorological, and it at Punta Cana and really since the air traffic was very little use. When we started talking with colleagues there in the Dominican we realized that there is no culture of use. of meteorological by air traffic It very little that is used. So let's get into the subject starting with what is a meteorological Well, meteorological is basically an antenna that sends a signal that bounces with something and returns. This is the fundamental of the radar. In case of the Doppler, the Doppler measures It's a 400 km It catches our attention when we the the IDAAC talking about a 400 km things like that. When the curvature of the Earth doesn't allow you to have a radar range, how good it is, because the Earth is changing, the horizon is changing, and an antenna that is on Earth sending a signal to the air, it's very difficult for it to do that. the speed, the distance of that object with which it bounces, and thus can have an image of what it is and where it It is this with which it bounces. the signal will be ⁓ rotated with the ground and return effectively. That's triangulations The ⁓ American one, which was two or three months ago, also WRS 300, also from a both very modern, from last generation, and both from aviation, only, like the Punta Cana This is used in many different for example in the same air the primary is the structure it uses to detect the aircraft, the rebound of the signal, the distance, the time the signal to return, this is how the distance and the speed of the object and the altitude at it was So we got into an important that is these are IDAAC that should be connected to the air traffic because their function is to help air specifically to avoid bad weather, storms, that airplanes can evade this, so it is a tool for operational for aviation. But we have noticed that today, So when we this to meteorology, the radar is detecting precipitation, type of precipitation, speed of and lightning and everything else that is there, the hail and everything else associated with the storms. The radar is not a for predicting. is important to that statement because we have seen how many people complain that we have the radars but they us anything about what was coming. The radar is only to detect what is in the moment. It is for predicting. That is important to None of the three radars have been connected to the air traffic We have visited the National for Air Traffic and we have seen that there they have a room with the image of the radar, internet and everything else, but they on the radar screen of the controller, which is is directing the planes. The controllers I have understood to this day if it has been done So, in the type of meteorological there are different things that interest different industries. For example, aviation, issue of rain, for example, is something that is important for certain types of operations, but not for all operations. But it would very important for agriculture, for example. Or... There been very few, but there has been no change in the way they depending, or based on this. And the truth is that the radars have on for years and we see very little use of them, both in meteorology and in the other industries that were mentioned that were going to be used. And this is where the annoyance of the population The amount of water that fell is not something that is interested in knowing, but it in agriculture and so on. What aviation is interested is what impacts the operation. Things like wind of risks associated with the storm for aviation. I'm in the city Miami. Here, precisely today, was rain, there a storm. Here in the United States, receive a notification saying, light rain is coming in the next 8 minutes. It last 15 minutes, for example. Because the system already automatically you this alert. such as gusts of wind, hail, moderate or strong etc. We have to go to the basics of meteorology and remember that the storms, mainly of the type like the nimbus, are high vertical Also when there are rain, or gusts of wind, or tornadoes, all these alerts are automatic on the cell phone. this is the difference we see with the Dominican Okay, we going to use those radars for indoor and co-air not only aviation. Well, then we have to connect all this to cell phone and they are mostly in the tropical areas near the equator of planet. Why? Because need low pressure or space inside the atmosphere to be to develop vertically. and we have to start informing people about the things that radar can give us. can't be that having a triangulation like the we have and that there are 400 millimeters of rain or that 400 millimeters of rain and that this form of of colors is on a map. When you go to polar like Alaska or southern Chile, it's very difficult to this kind of storm. You never see it because the atmosphere is closer to the ground. Normally the pressure is higher and the heat is also lower. So the fuel for the development of these storms On the hand, the tropics, are all these elements and they storms that have color yellow, color green, color red, on an immobile This is like from the 90s. is, technology is for that and each radar of this was an investment of 4 or 5 million dollars. total, about 15 million dollars were spent for this triangulation and they are being used for aviation, as we said, but neither for what they have been advertising that is going to used, which is for the COE, Indomed and everything else. So is ⁓ The truth is that this generates a little bit rage that political marketing done with these things and that it is being used. We, the pilots, have asked that the ADSB is the Datalink. The director of IDAC, Igor Rodriguez, has said that this comes with an air traffic that will be put in Santiago soon and we that this image of radar the wind in the storm and the type of precipitation is linked to that vertical Why? Because the storm, it takes all the moisture that is in the earth and elevates due to the low pressure, this moisture condenses, it forms water, forms ice, and when it the top of the storm, falls like ice, generally like ice first, the ash, and then evaporates and becomes water. The longer the fall, it creates wind. can be projected to the planes that have access to that technology and have a complete image. this is fairly broad we are to make other episodes where we may have some guests talking about this, but seeing what happened today and that there was no immediate vertical, down. can be down or up depending on part of the storm you are entering. the truth is that one gets upset and frustrated. Here in the city Miami, you can be in a neighborhood different from another and you get the alert that in that neighborhood, that is, the 10 miles around me, it is going to rain heavily when maybe, I don't know, 20 miles more to the beach it is not raining. So this is how accurate the information that can be dangerous for aviation and for people on land. When the storm has a vertical reach of that magnitude and the ice, this condensation, is such that it does give time to melt in the fall and has very strong then it on the ground like a hail. If you look on the internet, can see many planes and how long it and what kind of rain and everything else. So, that the city of Santo Domingo, the national district, has 2 million people and 30, 40, 50 kilometers wide, well, truth is that doesn't help much to the one who is deciding if is going to it on February or the Núñez de Cáceres. So, have use the technology and have use it for the one that was bought. that have had an with Graniso and destroyed the front part of the aircraft because they are pieces of ice hitting the plane in the air. So meteorological help us detect all this and evade it. aviation, the way we with storms is evading them. So, what do we inside the plane? You have to integrate air traffic have to train them on the subject, have to create policy to help aircraft for detours. In the city of New York, in Kennedy, when you ask for authorization to take and there are storms, the airport changes the route without you asking to evade the storm. And if don't have fuel, you take fuel before leaving and if you have fuel, you don't leave. Within the airplane we have meteorological all aircraft have required this type of instrumentation, and if they have deferred, that if have it is not working, then cannot fly in stormy Therefore, what have on the plane is a meteorological radar that looks forward. The radar is in the nose of the plane and is detecting the meteorology that is both above, at the same level and below the plane, depending on the angle at which point the antenna. but you change the route to avoid it. is a proactive You don't everything in the of pilots and you wish for best. No, work as team. And this is what is not being done in the Dominican So thank you for following us. Remember that you can find us on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Amazon Music. Subscribe and thank you for listening us. A storm or a storm cloud, a storm line can be quite large, can be hundreds of miles long. depending on where the plane located at that time, you will see the part that is in front of the plane. So what does that That there are ways that the storm takes that can deceive you. It can make believe, for example, that turning right is where there storm. It is where it is clearer. And you enter a corridor surrounded by another part of the storm and then you have no way out. One of the things that pilots teach us is to know how to how these parts of the storm that must be but not always you can identify it and you can get into an area that was better to have completely evaded So that's where the Earth's meteorological radars ⁓ ideally projected, sent now with Datalink to the aircraft where we now with the iPad, if we have internet or a system that we have mentioned before, which is the ADS-B, that sends data link of the aircraft and land, but one can see the complete from above and see then which is the best way to evade it. This is a super important in modern Not all planes have that capacity, obviously, and then those who do have have to use this older If we add satellite where you can see how far the storm what is the maximum what kind of it where it is moving and everything else. So you have a complete meteorological image and it strategic and you can make better decisions. So all this together is what helps you as a pilot to develop the flight So I have spoken before with other colleagues. the importance of this for the decision making at the time of our flights and especially long haul as we call them in English. Why these? Because in a flight of 8, 9, 10 hours, for example a Madrid-Santo Domingo, you only have access to the forecast, right? So you go out with a forecast that normally does it la oficina de meteorologia del destino al que vas. Digamos que en el caso de República Dominicana sería el Instituto Dominicano de Meteorología, INDOMED. Y si ese pronóstico no es certero o está muy desviado de la realidad, pues puedes tú tomar decisiones en base a un pronóstico que quizá te decía que todo iba estar bien y cuando llegues te encuentras con otra cosa. Porque es importante that part of beginning of the flight in the analysis. Airlines are very tight Airlines generally do generate many earnings. the fuel saving is super important. So when you are in a place far from the Dominican and you go to the Dominican Republic, if the meteorological of Indometh establishes the sky will be blue, that there will be no problem, you will only the fuel required by regulation. is possible that you as an old ask for little more fuel because you that there mistakes or that Caribbean or the tropics can be very changing, etc. But the airlines generally, all, will try to take the fuel Just. No more. So that's we started to have a topic. Because if 8 or 9 hours later we found that this forecast was totally wrong and instead of we found a storm, a big amount of well, now we'll in a project. of which the experience is what helps us to get So that's where these meteorological that we've been saying that we have to buy, install and connect play a fundamental role in helping these planes that come from afar and those come from nearby, obviously to all, to find the safest to get in or out of these airports. The regulation establishes you must always have fuel to go to an alternate or to do some kind of waiting pattern and everything else. So you don't arrive with the fuel right at the destination, but you have a little more. But that little more is sometimes enough for two or three laps to go to the alternate. In case of the Dominican a small that crosses completely in about 20 minutes flight. and all the airports are next to each other, so generally, if things are bad in Punta Cana, it will also bad in Santo Domingo and so on. So it's a topic, and we have to be careful. So this is idea of what a meteorological and why is important for aviation. So in the Dominican Republic, talking little bit the history of these radars, The Punta Cana was the first meteorological in the country in late 2010. It a joint between airports. should noted that all navigation equipment or navigation is established by law, is the of the IDAAC, the Dominican Civil Aviation even if the airport is private. People say, well, the airport is private, why don't they their own radars or put their own runway and everything else? Well, because the airport, although it private, has a public function, And it is interconnected with the entire national airport and the national So when the tracks of these airports are projected, to airspace, the arrivals, the departure of the planes, all this is coordinated by the IDAC, the IDAC, are the owners of the air traffic in the the air traffic in the Dominican So all these teams help that navigation, help that air and the aircraft in flight, therefore they help the national system. of airspace and airports. That's the IDAAC is the responsible in private and public obviously, of all these teams. So, airport of Punta Cana in 2010, I think it was 2011, made the purchase of one these radars in coordination with the IDAAC and I think the IDAAC was paying it by reducing taxes. But that radar only lasted a few years. and by 2017 or 2018 it was working. I don't even know what type of radar it is or anything like that. In 2019 a new meteorological from a Finnish called Via Sala, which just said that it only manufactures meteorological for aviation. We will back to this point And a WRM- 200 is the model that is a small radar designed for airports, for local what is called the approximation and departure of the airports, about five miles, ten miles and its use is no than that. After this, then it I think in 2021 or 2022, already at that time we were pushing the issue along with our friend Jim Suriel at CDN and John Morales here in Miami. We were on several television talking about the issue and well, government then decided to two more radars through IDAC, which were going to installed at the airport, one in Puerto Plata and another in Santo Domingo. The idea was to make the island and have a better image of the weather conditions from different angles. As I said before, this is important because storms can be quite large and having different radar or different radar helps you see the storm from different points. The distance of the radar and the curvature of the Earth makes the Love. the accuracy of the is lower. So combining it among several helps you have a better image.