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[[image]] Chapter 8: Weather! Objective: To learn how how to access and read weather maps, and understand how weather can affect KidSat photo selection. This chapter provides an introduction to weather and weather systems, and introduces your students to web sites that will allow them to view live weather images, and to follow weather patterns around the world. The chapter then describes how weather can affect the shuttle mission itself (primarily by delaying its launch) and, most importantly, how it can affect the targeting of KidSat images. During the flight, your students will be selecting parts of the world to photograph. The weather is an important consideration in the selection. If an area is covered with clouds, you may not want to photograph it! Conversely, if there is an active hurricane, you may want to try to capture it. Your SMOC will have a station where students are responsible for checking the weather over the sites that other students have selected as targets. This chapter will teach them how to access the latest weather maps on the web, and interpret those maps to determine the likelihood of getting good (clear) photographs of the ground. Although being able to determine the weather over a site is not essential, it certainly helps ensure that the pictures are good ones. Essentials: • The key weather web sites can be accessed from: [[Bold]]http://www.kidsat.ucsd.edu/kitsat/clouds/index.html [[/Bold]] • (Nearly) live views from weather satellites are available on the web. These enable your students to determine whether a given location is covered with clouds. • Your students will need to know how to recognize clouds in these satellite views, and relate the satellite photo to a map. • It is essential to use these weather web sites during the mission if you want to: (1) ensure that areas you photograph are relatively clear, or (2) photograph certain types of weather. Teachers' Handbook Page 42
