The availability performance of the GCOS Upper-Air Network (GUAN) is obtained by selecting the following options: “upper-air” and “availability” in the WDQMS web tool (for GCOS monitoring module and Monitoring category, respectively). The maps display the monthly availability performance for each GUAN station highlighting differences in reporting performances according to the GCOS minimum requirements (25 daily soundings up to 30hPa). The reporting performances fall into the following categories: not reporting during the period (black); reporting below requirements (red, orange and yellow); and fully reporting (green). Worth noting that the system allows to distinguish the stations that did not send any report during the selected month (black) from the stations that sent reports that never reached 30hPa (red) within the selected month. Clicking on a dot on the map shows a pop-up window with detailed information about the station data availability over the selected month and a link to the station metadata in OSCAR/Surface. Moreover, clicking on “Time series” on the pop-up will display a 1-year time series of the monthly total ascents that reached up to 30hPa.
The quality performance of the GCOS upper-air land component is available on WDQMS web tool when “quality” (as Monitoring category) of “upper-air” in the “GCOS” monitoring module is selected. By selecting the month and variable, a map will show how the observing network meets the GCOS requirements set for the selected variable. The generated map is based on the root mean square error (rmse, section 3.2) calculated for the month and variable of interest. It shows the stations whose observations are considered useful for Climate purposes (greenish dots), and highlights the major anomalies regarding stations with observations that deviate from the model forecasts quite significantly (yellow, orange and red dots) and exceed the limits set as “threshold” requirements (Table 7). Clicking on a dot on the map opens a screen with detailed information about the station data quality for the selected month, i.e., the rmse of all available variables (i.e., air temperature, wind and humidity). Clicking on “Time series” opens a screen with a chart containing the quality information over time (1 year), namely the time series with monthly values of rmse of O-B calculated for all the variable available (i.e., air temperature, wind and humidity).