An experiment in three-dimensional objective analysis

Some experiments in the three-dimensional objective analysis of contour height structure are described. In the scheme adopted, a family of surfaces is fitted to the data available in the vicinity of each grid point and the resulting analysis is in the form of four parameters defining the contour heights above the point at all pressure levels up to 200 mb. The scheme has the merit that many varieties of data can be exploited simultaneously. Verification statistics indicate that the analyses are good except in the lower stratosphere and an additional parameter would be necessary to overcome this shortcoming.