Single radar / Utah

Cedar City radar KICX

The weather service radar at Cedar City, Utah, alone: each picture it makes from its own scans, at four tilts from its lowest up, every few minutes. Reflectivity, velocity, storm relative velocity, correlation coefficient and differential reflectivity, the storms it tracks and where they are headed, and how high its beam passes. How to read them.

Latest scan: 6:29 AM UTC
Scanning: Precipitation mode, pattern 212
Tilts: 0.5°, 1.3°, 2.4°, 3.1°
Stands at: 37.591°N 112.862°W, 10,643 ft above sea level
Reaches: 286 mi with reflectivity, 186 mi with velocity, 143 mi with storm relative velocity

KICX on the map

Storms it tracks

The radar follows each storm cell from scan to scan, measures the way it is moving, and puts it ahead 15 to 60 minutes. Each is drawn on the map above, its track to the hour ahead marked each quarter hour.

Storm cells KICX tracks, from its scan of 6:23 AM UTC
Storm	Where	Moving	In 30 minutes	In 60 minutes	Last forecast off by
U8	12 mi north of Toquerville, UT27 mi from the radar, bearing 241°	Toward the northwest at 63 mph	-	-	5.5 mi
L9	60 mi south of the radar60 mi from the radar, bearing 176°	First seen this scan	-	-	0 mi
V8	43 mi southeast of the radar43 mi from the radar, bearing 127°	Toward the north northeast at 55 mph	46 mi east of the radar	-	1.6 mi
N8	43 mi east southeast of the radar43 mi from the radar, bearing 102°	Toward the north northwest at 53 mph	-	-	3.8 mi
Y8	62 mi west of the radar62 mi from the radar, bearing 260°	First seen this scan	-	-	0 mi
N9	5 mi west of Centennial Park, AZ45 mi from the radar, bearing 195°	First seen this scan	-	-	0 mi
O9	9 mi south southeast of Washington, UT52 mi from the radar, bearing 219°	First seen this scan	-	-	0 mi
B7	15 mi south southeast of the radar15 mi from the radar, bearing 156°	Toward the northeast at 61 mph	8 mi south southeast of Panguitch, UT	-	2.1 mi
L8	15 mi southwest of Beaver, UT39 mi from the radar, bearing 360°	Toward the north northeast at 43 mph	11 mi north northwest of Beaver, UT	79 mi north northeast of the radar	0.7 mi
F9	3 mi southeast of the radar4 mi from the radar, bearing 136°	Toward the north northeast at 59 mph	-	-	4.4 mi

How high it sees

The beam leaves the radar tilted up and the earth curves away under it, so the farther from the radar, the higher it passes. Rain or snow falling under the lowest beam is not seen: far from the radar, shallow snow and drizzle can fall unseen. The heights are the standard ones, the air bending the beam as the weather service’s own rule takes it.

The middle of each tilt’s beam, in feet above the radar’s antenna, and how wide the beam has grown
Tilt	25 mi	50 mi	100 mi	150 mi	200 mi
0.5°	1,500 ft	3,600 ft	9,600 ft	18,200 ft	29,200 ft
1.3°	3,300 ft	7,200 ft	17,000 ft	29,300 ft	44,000 ft
2.4°	5,800 ft	12,300 ft	27,200 ft	44,500 ft	64,400 ft
3.1°	7,500 ft	15,600 ft	33,600 ft	54,200 ft	77,400 ft
Width	2,200 ft	4,400 ft	8,800 ft	13,100 ft	17,500 ft

How to read the pictures

Reflectivity: How strongly rain, snow and hail send the pulse back, in dBZ: the stronger, the heavier.
Velocity: The wind along the beam, in mph: green toward the radar, red away. Where the two meet tightly, the wind turns.
Storm relative velocity: The same wind with the storms’ own motion taken away, so a storm’s turning stands out: a tight pair of green and red is a rotating storm.
Correlation coefficient: How alike the returns of one pulse are, 0 to 1: rain and snow near 1, hail and melting snow lower, and debris a tornado lifts well below 0.8.
Differential reflectivity: How much wider than tall what falls is, in dB: large flat raindrops read high, hail and dry snow near 0.

Each picture is one tilt of one scan, as the radar sent it: its lowest tilt first, then three above it, the angles its scan pattern sets. A picture at a higher tilt sees higher into a storm, and farther over the ground at each distance. Press a point on the map to read the value there.

As data: /radar/now.json?show=sref&site=KICX, the times of its frames, and /radar/s/KICX/storms.json, the storms it tracks.