Summary
This report describes a formal Assessment of the Terminal Convective Weather Forecast (TCWF) algorithm, developed under the FAA Aviation Weather Research Program by MIT Lincoln Laboratory as part of the Convective Weather Product Development Team (PDT). TCWF is proposed as a Pre-Planned Product Improvement (P3I) enhancement to the operational ITWS currently scheduled for deployment at major airports in 2002. The TCWF Assessment in Memphis, TN ran from 24 March to 30 September 2000. The performance of TCWF was excellent on the large scale, organized storm systems it was designed to predict, and the software was extremely stable during the Assessment. Small changes to the algorithm parameters were made as a result of the 2000 testing. The TCWF performance can be improved on airmass storms and on forecasting new growth and subsequent decay of large-scale storms. These are active areas of research for future ITWS P3I builds.