The 2000 America's Cup

Meteorologists from The Atmospheric Studies Group provided meteorological support to Team Dennis Conner during the 2000 America's Cup races held in October 1999 – March 2000.

ASG provided forecast computer simulations of hourly weather conditions over the Hauraki Gulf, near Auckland for each race day.   These forecast simulations were produced twice daily from ASG's local office in Massachusetts using the state-of-the-science MM5 numerical weather prediction model.  The model was run with triple nests with the innermost nest at a grid resolution of 3km directly centered over the Hauraki Gulf Race course.  These fine scale simulations provided valuable information on the small scale winds such as sea breezes and terrain affected flow associated with the hills surrounding the Gulf.

The data from the numerical weather prediction model was run during normal daylight hours in the US, i.e. during the night in New Zealand and the model results were available for analysis first thing on the morning of race day.  An ASG scientist in New Zealand provided real-time analysis of the meteorological conditions to the racing crew just before the start of each race.

The view in the photograph above is looking southeastward from Rakino Island directly into the Hauraki Gulf (see arrow on left) and the 2000 America's Cup racing course.