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KMD 250 Pilot's Guide
Section 2
FIS Operation
Rev 4 Aug/2007
BASIC SERVICE WEATHER PRODUCTS
The following is a discussion of weather products offered with the basic
no-fee VDL service. Accessing and navigating these services will be
discussed in detail later in this addendum.
All basic and value-added products (except those identified as VDL only)
can also be obtained through a single fee-based XM subscription ser-
vice.
METAR
A METAR (Aviation Routine Weather Report) describes the specific
weather conditions at a particular airport at a given time. The elements
of a METAR are in order as follows:
1. Type of report
2. ICAO station identifier
3. Date and time of issue
4. Modifier (AUTO if automated report or COR if corrected observation)
5. Wind
6. Visibility
7. Runway visual range (as required)
8. Weather phenomena
9. Sky condition
10. Temperature/dew point group
11. Altimeter
12. Remarks (as required)
METARs available within the selected range of the selected area will be
displayed up to a maximum of 25 reports. These reports are displayed
in an encoded textual format. METARs displayed graphically on the
map are offered through a subscription service.
NOTE: When a specific element of METAR data is not available, it is
omitted from the report. The user must know the sequence of data to
recognize omissions. METAR observations older than 120 minutes will
be discarded.
See the section on Understanding Textual Aviation Weather Reports, for
instructions on decoding textual METARs.
Basic Service Weather Products
KMD 250 FIS_R4 8/13/07 10:07 AM Page 2-7