I am completing the integration of a web transaction with the Air Resources Laboratory (ARL) hosted at the NOAA website. The ARL provides wind data forecasts, known as a GFS Sounding, for up to two weeks in the future.
With their permission, I submit the launch site coordinates and other launch data, present and collect the Security Code (it is required), and finally retrieve the predicted wind data. Flight Track uses the wind data to make a flight path prediction. With this integration, the prediction workflow is easier and faster. In testing, Flight Track retrieves the data in seconds where a manual method may take up to a minute.
Some of the interesting bugs along the way were entering the wrong Security Code, misunderstanding when the wind data model time starts, and selecting the correct Forecast Cycle. Looking forward to completing this testing and making this available to Flight Track users!