Company Moves To MidAmerica Airport
University Corporation For Atmospheric Research
Leases Space To Study Weather
MidAmerica Airport, Illinois (March 21, 2003) -- A research experiment will become MidAmerica-St. Louis Airport's temporary tenant.
The University Corporation for Atmospheric Research will rent 4,000 square feet of the terminal for about $4,000 a month to study damaging thunderstorm and squall winds in the Midwest. St. Clair County Public Building Commissioners voted Thursday to lease a portion of the terminal to the nonprofit corporation.
The corporation will move into the airport on May 20 to conduct experiments to study bow echoes, which accompany thunderstorm squalls and produce damaging surface winds. Work is expected to wrap up about July 6.
The scientists will bring three airplanes and about 75 researchers to the airport. As part of the experiment, researchers will offer tours to local schoolchildren, but airport director Tim Cantwell said the specifics of the program haven't been completed yet.
The experiment will use three aircraft to study the weather systems that contain sustained high winds. They appear on radar in a bow shape.
Each year in the United States, these winds pose a significant hazard to life and property. According to one study conducted from January 1995 to July 2000, more than $1.4 billion in property damage, 72 deaths and 1,008 injuries were reported to the National Weather Service as having been caused by such winds.
"They could have gone anywhere in the Midwest, but they opted to come here," Cantwell told the commissioners, who agreed to the contract pending a legal review.
The corporation is funded by government grants and its home base is in Boulder, Colorado.
Information provided by the Belleville News-Democrat
Beth Hundsdorfer Article © the Belleville News-Democrat
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