Later, I sat on a retaining wall and watched the first substantial storms of the day move in over the ocean from the east. Yesterday's forecast brought the rain to Kwajalein about six hours too soon. That means the TRMM overpass at 12:30 p.m. didn't get to see a whole lot, but it still appears that there will be more tonight. Accordingly, we're planning for a sunrise (7 a.m.) aircraft mission, preceeded by the forecast meeting at 4:30 a.m.! It's sort of a paradox that we have to forecast the rain, when the rain is what we want to study!

That's where sitting on the retaining wall comes in. It seems really important to just watch a few of these systems in the hopes of developing a better qualitative feel for how they behave. We know from radar and satellite data that individual convective cells can become quite vigorous and then die out completely in just minutes. Subsequently, other cells might or might not spring up to take the place of the previous cells. The evolution of the storms this afternoon looked fairly coherent, so I'll be interested in seeing what the radar reported. After the first batch of rain went past I went for a walk to stretch my bike-weary legs. I left my my raincoat snoozing peacefully on the bed in my quarters, so naturally the next batch of rain came during my walk!

I also discovered today that the chapel has a noise problem. It's a very pretty A-frame with the last four feet or so of the eaves left open. This gives the kids a quick exit, but also lets in the engine noise from the air terminal, which is right across the street. That's actually typical of Kwaj. You have a small town, complete with airport, port, and offices compressed onto an island. I heard from one of the grad students that the road along the south side of the runway has to be closed when the C-5A is taking off or landing because its wingspan is so large.

Tomorrow morning is going to come awfully early. Part of me hopes that the ride to the Operations Center is dry, although that goes against the reason we're here.