ARINC takes on weather data project

ARINC—Rockwell Collins of Annapolis, Md., has won a $7.2 million contract from the National Weather Service for weather observations from commercial aircraft sensors and related data.

The weather service intends to improve its understanding of the structure of the atmospheric water vapor, temperature, wind, and pressure by collecting data from sensors attached to aircraft. The data gathered through these observations is critical to predicting thunderstorms, flash floods, hail, tornadoes and other weather events,the weather service said.

ARINC-Rockwell Collins will share all its weather-sensor metadata and sampling techniques, provide aircraft data that meet particular data standards, and continue to deliver reliable data to NWS.

NWS released its initial solicitation in July. It announced the award Sept. 22.