MESSAGE TO THE RESEARCH AIRCRAFT COMMUNITY
Cc:HIPT
From: Dave Carlson, ATD Director, and
Dave Jorgensen, Chairman, HIAPER Advisory Committee

Dear Colleagues:

This is to let you know that the HIAPER Advisory Committee (HAC) was appointed by T. Killeen, NCAR director, after consultation with National Science Foundation.  HAC held its first meeting at the NSF, in September.  A summary of the discussions at that meeting is attached, and has also been posted to the HIAPER website (http://www.hiaper.ucar.edu/hac.html) as a part of our continuing efforts to keep you informed about the HIAPER procurement and plans.  Please check the web site for future summaries, and let us know if you have any questions.

HIAPER ADVISORY COMMITTEE - SUMMARY OF FIRST MEETING

Members of the Committee:  Dave Jorgensen - NOAA (elected chairman); Estelle Condon - NASA; Mike Coffey - NCAR; Jennifer Francis – Rutgers; Chet Gardner – Univ. of Illinois; Don Lenschow – NCAR; Roddy Rogers – NSF; Eric Saltzman – U. of Calif-Irvine; and Ron Smith - Yale.

The HIAPER Advisory Committee (HAC) held its first meeting at NSF on 19 September 2000.  This summary of the topics discussed is prepared for general community information; questions or comments may be addressed to Dave Jorgensen (davej@ncar.ucar.edu), Dave Carlson (dcarlson@ucar.edu), Jim Huning (jhuning@nsf.gov), or any member of the committee.

HAC ROLE:  The committee is to ensure that the HIAPER is of maximum benefit for the community.  HAC is advisory to the Director of NCAR.

PROCUREMENT STATUS: UCAR issued an RFP in June, and proposals were due on 15 September. The Evaluation and Selection process is currently underway, and is being conducted by the Evaluation and Selection Team (EST), whose members are: Henry Boynton, Al Cooper, Jack Fox, Krista Laursen, Mark Lord, Beth Stansberry and Jeff Stith. Stith and Stansberry are co-chairs.

The recommendation for award will be made by the EST to Carlson, and thence will be reviewed with the HAC. The members of the HAC asked that they be provided with sufficient information about the ranges of rankings among requirements, and among vendors to enable them to make sound judgment regarding the recommendation.  To this end, in addition to material provided in writing in advance, it may be decided to convene a joint meeting of the EST and the HAC.

The EST will brief the HAC chairman on their progress this winter, then the HAC chairman will provide a brief status report to the HAC via e-mail.  Then the HAC will discuss the desirability of holding a joint EST/HAC meeting.

BUDGET:  $8.5M has been transferred to NCAR in FY2000 funds toward HIAPER costs. Acquisition, modification and instrumentation of the aircraft are one of NSF’s highest priorities for FY2002 and beyond.  The FY2001 budget is unknown at this time and it is also not known when Congress will act on the NSF appropriations bill.

SCHEDULE:  The current master schedule has HIAPER making its first research flight in the spring of 2005.  This schedule necessarily makes assumptions about availability of funds and length of time for various aspects (such as modification of the green airframe), anyone of which is subject to change.

INSTRUMENTATION: There was extensive discussion among the HAC and with NCAR and ATM staff present regarding plans for a community workshop on instrumentation and the process by which instrumentation development proposals will be sought and awarded.  It was agreed that the proposal solicitation and award process should follow standard NSF procedures.  Plans for a second community workshop to focus on instrumentation development were reaffirmed. The workshop goal is to identify instrument development need, which will be the basis for an announcement of opportunity.  The best time to hold the workshop would be when the specific airframe and budgets are known.

The NSF Oversight Committee (NOC) for HIAPER participated in part of the meeting, as did NSF/ATM program officers, and staff from ATD and UCAR.

END OF SUMMARY