MADIS - The Meteorological Assimilation Data Ingest System

Leon Benjamin (1), Gopa Padmanabhan (2), Greg Pratt (3)

Abstract
MADIS is a research to Operations success story. MADIS ingests data from NOAA data sources and non-NOAA providers, decodes the data then encodes all of the observational data into a common format with uniform observational units and time stamps. Quality checks are conducted and the integrated data sets are stored along with a series of flags indicating the results of the various QC checks. MADIS provides several methods for users to access the data to meet their needs. Users can request data from July of 2001, which is when MADIS was first available to the public, to the present. To provide these services, MADIS leverages partnerships with international agencies; federal, state, and local agencies (e.g., states' Departments of Transportation); universities; volunteer networks; and the private sector (e.g., airlines, railroads) to integrate and quality check observations from their stations with those of NOAA. MADIS runs operationally at the NWS National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) Central Operations (NCO) as part of the Integrated Dissemination Project (IDP). All MADIS data is being added to NOAA's data archive that is run by the National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service (NESDIS) National Climate Data Center (NCDC). Research and development efforts are being provided by NOAA's Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research (OAR) Earth System Research Laboratory (ESRL) Global Systems Division (GSD). MADIS was transitioned to NWS January 2015 from OAR/ESRL/GSD.