Readme 10/30/2002 by Mark Chandler, mchandler@giss.nasa.gov The FORTRAN program getstms.f extracts storm track information from the 1961-1998 storm tracks database that was used to create the on-line Atlas of Extratropical Storm Tracks. It also writes the extracted data to a text file "report" (st_report.txt). This report is a data table with information about the location and central pressure of all the cyclones in the atlas during a specified date range. The format of the table is described next and refers to the example, below: For each 12-hour time period a list of each of the extratropical storms that BEGAN during the 12 hours prior is written to the report. Then each storm that began during the period is "tracked" for the life of that storm (typically they last from four to ten 12-hour periods, or 2 to 6 days). In the table below each 12-hour period begins with a header indicating the date and time (00Z,12Z) that storms were first detected. The columns below each header are, 1st column identifies a storm which began in the 12 hours prior to 1998/12/01 00Z (e.g. 1=storm 1, 2=storm 2, etc.) 2nd column identifies for how many 12 hour periods each storm persists 3rd column is longitude of central pressure (sub-grid scale) 4th column is latitude of central pressure (sub-grid scale) 5th column is central pressure in millibars 6th column is year/month/day 7th column is hour (GMT) This is followed by another header and table showing all the storms that began during the next 12-hour period, and so on... 1998/12/01 00 Number of Storms Begun 3 1 1 -44.44 -59.59 946.84 1998/12/01 00 1 2 -34.33 -57.13 940.29 1998/12/01 12 1 3 -29.39 -60.22 944.02 1998/12/02 00 1 4 -42.99 -71.94 948.63 1998/12/02 12 2 1 46.87 -49.40 979.41 1998/12/01 00 2 2 55.53 -52.71 972.02 1998/12/01 12 2 3 62.78 -55.53 953.54 1998/12/02 00 2 4 68.11 -58.05 940.26 1998/12/02 12 2 5 71.54 -58.80 943.98 1998/12/03 00 2 6 78.68 -60.13 948.95 1998/12/03 12 2 7 85.02 -61.30 953.33 1998/12/04 00 2 8 90.41 -62.37 956.95 1998/12/04 12 2 9 94.24 -62.79 961.59 1998/12/05 00 2 10 100.15 -68.90 964.33 1998/12/05 12 3 1 -151.26 -8.68 1007.00 1998/12/01 00 3 2 -155.43 -13.87 1006.59 1998/12/01 12 3 3 -154.93 -15.14 1006.30 1998/12/02 00 3 4 -154.06 -14.98 1005.05 1998/12/02 12 1998/12/01 12 Number of Storms Begun 3 1 1 -170.78 -72.92 969.27 1998/12/01 12 1 2 -160.04 -70.86 969.45 1998/12/02 00 1 3 -143.07 -68.16 963.20 1998/12/02 12 1 4 -132.44 -67.29 956.86 1998/12/03 00 1 5 -123.69 -67.53 954.86 1998/12/03 12 1 6 -115.47 -67.68 959.86 1998/12/04 00 1 7 -105.11 -68.50 965.79 1998/12/04 12 2 1 -81.50 60.12 986.92 1998/12/01 12 2 2 -64.58 56.67 986.25 1998/12/02 00 2 3 -58.68 55.62 984.94 1998/12/02 12 2 4 -53.09 54.58 982.30 1998/12/03 00 3 1 17.81 73.39 981.82 1998/12/01 12 3 2 39.05 72.38 976.50 1998/12/02 00 3 3 51.47 70.38 973.69 1998/12/02 12 3 4 56.49 69.09 976.88 1998/12/03 00 3 5 61.35 67.86 984.73 1998/12/03 12 3 6 68.43 65.51 991.73 1998/12/04 00 1998/12/02 00 Number of Storms Begun 2 1 1 -5.18 33.66 1010.25 1998/12/02 00 1 2 -1.93 32.94 1007.41 1998/12/02 12 1 3 1.74 36.60 1006.69 1998/12/03 00 1 4 5.19 37.63 1002.34 1998/12/03 12 1 5 9.00 40.65 998.05 1998/12/04 00 1 6 11.26 42.43 996.54 1998/12/04 12 2 1 162.81 50.90 986.76 1998/12/02 00 2 2 166.83 55.14 977.98 1998/12/02 12 2 3 169.83 56.66 974.23 1998/12/03 00 2 4 175.42 58.36 976.22 1998/12/03 12 2 5 -175.12 60.25 979.84 1998/12/04 00 2 6 -167.96 62.30 983.16 1998/12/04 12 2 7 -144.95 60.40 986.17 1998/12/05 00 2 8 -139.66 59.30 988.50 1998/12/05 12