World Meteorological Organization

Arctic Ocean Radio Soundings Available from 10 August to 18 September 2025

Notification from the Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute (SMHI)

Arctic Ocean radio soundings will be available four times daily (00, 06, 12 & 18 UTC) from 10 August to 18 September 2025 as a part of the Canada-Sweden Arctic Ocean 2025 research expedition. Soundings will be released from Swedish research icebreaker Oden (call sign SMLQ) in the central Arctic Ocean north of 80 °N, and reported using BUFR 309057. 

The GTS headers are as below: 

• IUSN41 ESWI (complete sounding)
• IUKN41 ESWI (up to 100 hPa) 

You can find more information about the expedition here. If you have any questions, please contact Åsa Lindgren, Head of Marine Operations, Swedish Polar Research Secretariat at asa.lindgren@polar.se. 

Published: 08 May 2025

New Bulletins with Radio Soundings from Troll Station(WSI:0-578-0-99990)

Notification from MET Norway

As from 5 March 2025 Met Norway will begin to distribute radio soundings in BUFR format once per day at 12 UTC in new bulletins IUKL01 ENMI, IUSL01 ENMI, and IUXL01 ENMI for the station 89504 TROLL (WIGOS station identifier 0-578-0-99990) in Antarctica, using BUFR templates 309057 and 309056. 

For any missing data in BUFR format, please contact NFP on WIS matters for Norway, Mr Pål Harald Sannes, at pals@met.no.

Published: 28 February 2025

Discontinuation of parallel broadcasting of French SYNOP data in FM12 TAC (ASCII) from 13 January 2025

Notification from Météo-France  

Starting 13 January 2025, Météo-France discontinues the parallel broadcasting of French SYNOP messages in FM12 TAC (Traditional Alphanumeric Code, ASCII). From this date, only BUFR format will be available for the following data: 

Data in FM12 TAC will no longer be available (Only BUFR available). GTS headers as below:

• S[M/N/I]FR LFPW
• SNFR[50-59] LFxx
• S[M/N/I]PF NTAA
• S[M/I]NC NWBB
• S[M/N/I]RE FMEE
• S[M/N/I]FG SOCA
• S[M/N/I]MR TFFF
• S[M/N/I]MF TFFR
• S[M/N/I]FP LFVP 

However, for the SYNOP data with the following GTS headers, both TAC and BUFR will remain available.

• S[M/I]AA01 LFPW
• S[M/I/N]RE15 FMEE
• SMFW01 NWBB
• SIFW20  NWBB
• SNNC3[0/1] NWBB 

For any missing data in BUFR format, please contact support.broadcast@meteo.fr.

Published: 04 February 2025

CLIMAT BUFR data format from Hungary will change from February 2025

Notification from HungaroMet Hungarian Meteorological Service (HungaroMet)  

Hungarian CLIMAT BUFR report (ISCD01 HABP) will be renewed from February 2025. The number of stations has been increased from 6 to 14. Regarding not all stations having the Traditional Station Identifier (TSI), the CLIMAT bulletin has been supplemented with the WIGOS Station Identifier (WSI). Consequently, BUFR template 307073 has been supplemented with descriptor 301150. The old CLIMAT BUFR  version will be replaced with the new one with the same header. 

For further information or support, please contact Imre Szöllősi (HungaroMet), National Focal Points on WIS matters for Hungary at szollosi.i@met.hu.

Published: 10  January 2025