Solar & Lift rows

Below the cloud strips: Solar is model shortwave radiation (dark = night/overcast, bright = strong surface heating). Lift estimates thermal updraft in m/s using the Deardorff (1970) convective velocity scale when the model provides surface heat flux (GFS/HRRR): w* = (g × virtual_heat_flux × BL_height / (ρ·Cp·T))^⅓ — identical to canadarasp. Falls back to √(CAPE/100) for models without heat flux (GEM, ICON, ECMWF). "cap" = CIN

Below the cloud strips: Solar is model shortwave radiation (dark = night/overcast, bright = strong surface heating). Lift estimates thermal updraft in m/s from CAPE: Lift = √(CAPE / 100) (100 J/kg → 1.0 m/s, 400 → 2.0 m/s). “cap” = CIN > 50 J/kg (convective inhibition).

Boundary layer on the chart

The yellow line is the model boundary-layer top: launch elevation (or lowest model level) plus boundary_layer_height above ground (from GFS/HRRR where available). Wind arrows are drawn on top.

Clouds tab

The main plot uses model cloud cover % at each pressure level: dark = clear air, light = thick cloud. Precipitation and the low / mid / high rows apply on every tab. Below those rows, the Solar strip (shortwave radiation — same scale as on the Wind tab) is shown here too.

Low / mid / high rows

Total cloud fraction in three altitude layers. Darker = more cloud.

Atmospheric stability (lapse rate)

Background colour shows the local lapse rate (°C per 1,000 ft) between adjacent model levels — identical to the canadarasp windgram colour scale.

DALR reference

The Dry Adiabatic Lapse Rate is −3 °C/1000 ft (−9.8 °C/km). Air below that boundary is absolutely unstable and thermals will fire freely.