Aviation Digital Data Service (ADDS)

ADDS (http://adds.aviationweather.gov/ ) makes available to the aviation community text, digital and graphical forecasts, analyses, and observations of aviation-related weather variables. ADDS is a joint effort of NCAR Research Applications Program (RAP), Global Systems Division (GSD) of NOAA's Earth System Research Laboratory (ESRL), and the National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) Aviation Weather Center (AWC).

http://weather.aero/tools/dataservices/textdataserver , http://weather.aero/tools/dataservices/textdataserver/default/gettingstarted , http://weather.aero/tools/dataservices/textdataserver/default/bestpractices

ADDS makes several data products available:

Data Product	Description
AIRCRAFTREPORTS	Aircraft reports are reports of actual weather conditions encountered by aircraft while in flight. The information is typically transmitted by radio to a ground station.
AIR/SIGMETs	An Air Significant Meteorological Advisory advises of weather that may be hazardous (other than convective activity) to aircraft, but are less severe than SIGMETs. This information is used by end-users that are directly related to aviation flight planning and safety of flight, including pilots and personnel who provide weather information to pilots. AIRMETs are regularly scheduled text messages containing a 6 hour forecast with a 6 to 12 hour outlook period.
METARs	A data format used around the world for reporting weather conditions every hour. A METAR weather report is predominantly used by pilots in fulfillment of a part of a pre-flight weather briefing, and by meteorologists, who use aggregated METAR information to assist in weather forecasting. Raw METAR is the most popular format in the world for the transmission of weather data. It is highly standardized through ICAO, which allows it to be understood throughout most of the world.
STATION INFO	Information pertaining to a particular station or group of stations i.e. latitude, longitude, elevation, etc.
TAFs	A Terminal Aerodrome Forecast (i.e. TAF) is an international standard code format for terminal forecasts issued for airports. TAFs are valid for a 30 hour time period and are issued 4 times a day at 6 hour intervals. The forecast includes forecasted wind speed, wind direction, visibility, ceiling, type of precipitation (i.e. snow, rain, etc.) and/or weather phenomenon.

ADDS data products, in XML format, are available from its EXPERIMENTAL site: http://weather.aero/ . Please review the disclaimer prior to use of the experimental data products. The disclaimer can be found at: http://weather.aero/disclaimer

The URL to retrieve a data product in XML format is entered as follows:

http://www.weather.aero/dataserver_current/httpparam?requestType=retrieve&format=xml&dataSource=DataProduct&Constraints

Where:

DataProduct is one of the following: “metars”, “aircraftreports”, “tafs”, “airsigmets”, “stations”
Constraints are qualifiers that are used to refine the search. A summary of constraints can be found at http://bcaws.aviationweather.gov/adds/dataserver/SummaryOfConstraints.php . stationString is a constraint that is used quite often. A list of stations can be found at http://aviationweather.gov/adds/metars/stations.txt .

Operation	Description
N/A