New topic required for RADOB

[shirley-xuelei]

Overview/

RADOB (Report of Ground Radar Weather Observation) is a ground-based radar meteorological observation report compliant with the specifications of FM 20–VIII RADOB . It is a standardized meteorological dataset generated by acquiring meteorological data through fixed ground radar equipment, and its core function is to real-time capture, transmit, and apply observational information related to weather systems in the atmosphere. The message sample is as follows.

SBHK20 VHHH 190100
FFAA 19005 45010 48191 11143 65//2 53013=

Currently, there is no Topic Hierarchy for RADOB data. Is the following proposed topic appropriate?

origin/a/wis2/centre-id/data/core/weather/surface-based-observations/radar/tropical-cyclone/location

Amendment Details

updated 23 March 2026
/weather/surface-based-observations/radar/radob

@tomkralidis @amilan17

[amilan17]

add RADOB?
origin/a/wis2/centre-id/data/core/weather/surface-based-observations/radob

[tomkralidis]

TT-WISMD 2026-03-10

• per FM-20, to be named origin/a/wis2/centre-id/data/core/weather/surface-based-observations/radob
• @josusky mentions that there may be radar data already exchanged on WIS2?
  • we should monitor and report back if/when we find notifications
• ACTION: @amilan17 to validate with Secretariat
• ACTION: @tomkralidis to PR into FT2026-1

[amilan17]

@bibraj As the Secretariat support for ET-OWR - can you help us with this WIS2 topic proposal?

[tomkralidis]

ACTION: @tomkralidis to PR into FT2026-1

PR in #279

[josusky]

Just for the record, we already have following radar-related and rather specific topic:

• weather/surface-based-observations/temperature-profile-radar
• weather/surface-based-observations/wind-profile-radar
  and some data are exchanged under these topics. Perhaps another, more generic can fit into it too.

And a quick search in the WIS Discovery Catalogue, reveals some radar related products:

• With topic cache/a/wis2/ca-eccc-msc/data/core/weather/experimental. (but I cannot find any data instances to it).
• Without topic, e.g. urn:wmo:md:ca-eccc-msc:2280b47c-fb7c-4bab-a632-33f59eb82385 (North American Radar Extrapolation Composite), sorry @tomkralidis for finger pointing;
• and a few that use non-existing topics:
  • weather/experimental/surface-based-observations/weather-radar
  • weather/experimental/surface-based-observations/radar

[bibraj]

RADOB is different from the level II and mosaic data covered by the already existing weather-radar topic. We may need to review if this legacy data format is still being operationally used by members. I can add this item to the agenda in the next ET-OWR meeting to obtain their views. We could hold the proposal till we get an official response from ET-OWR.