Design and implementation of a meteorological phenomena visualization method using google earth

Abstract

Virtual Globes, a tool for visualizing and sharing global spatial data on a three-dimensional (3D) space using an intuitive interface and simple markup language, is widely used as a visualization platform in geography and climate and environmental sciences. This study presents a representation method for realistic visualization of global meteorological phenomena on a webpage. Specifically, we designed and implemented a method for automatically publishing satellite data or meteorological predictions estimated from numeric models using keyhole markup language (KML) and created an animated visualization of data on Asian Dust and a typhoon, which are frequently observed in Korea, on Google Earth using the method. As the method allows users to intuitively understand temporal and spatial change patterns of meteorological phenomena, and interact with the visualized data, we expect it to be utilized as a data analytic tool for researchers and an informational and educational tool for the public. © 2016 SERSC.