By JEAN GORDON, The Daily Courier of Forest City

RUTHERFORDTON, N.C. NASA has placed two radars on land in Rutherford County for a science field campaign to study rainfall in the Smoky Mountains.

The campaign that began on May 1 will continue until June 15.

"We have set up rain gauges and radars across the area to learn more about how weather and rain systems behave in the mountains," said David Wolff, research scientist field support office with NASA located in Wallops Island, Va.

"The specific reason we are in North Carolina is to provide support for validation of the first, post-launch GPM ground-validation field campaign referred to as the Integrated Precipitation & Hydrology Experiment (IPHEx) which is being sponsored by NASA, Duke University (Dr. Ana Barros), and NOAA," Wolff said.

The field office, located off Lambs Grill Road is collecting data in conjunction with a satellite launched in February by NASA and the Japanese Exploration Agency. At that time Japan launched a $1.2 billion satellite mission to measure global rain and snowfall in an effort to help to supply scientists and forecaster data that can help predict the range of weather disasters across the county.

Several pieces of equipment, including two NASA satellite radars are set up in the field. The most visible from far distances is the 60-ton NASA radar.

Wolff talked about the decision to locate the field campaign in Rutherford County.

"We spent about two weeks traveling the area southwest of the Pigeon River basin and south of the Catawba River basin, where NASA, NOAA and Duke University have already placed a large array of ground-based precipitation measuring instruments," Wolff said. "We needed to find a site that was at a high enough elevation to see above the intervening foothills and did not have too many trees close to the site so that we could get an unobstructed view. I believe we found 13 possible sites, and the one we chose, after talking with the landowner, Charles Hanna, III satisfied our requirements and also had sufficient commercial power."

Visitors to a recent open house had an opportunity to catch a glimpse of NASA's high-altitude ER-2 aircraft that carries three radars and a radiometer to measure rainfall from 65,000 feet.

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NASA places radar in NC to study rain in Smokies