Bet-Winning Factoids

A poopy day at the airport finds you and your buddies sitting around engaged in a serious session of hangar flying. You decide to amaze the other airport bums with some interesting factoids about METARs and maybe even win a beer bet in the process.

Editorial Staff

Wednesday, September 09, 2015 at 12:00 AM ET

Verified

Key Takeaways:

METAR remarks like A01 or A02 identify automated stations and their ability to report precipitation types; their absence indicates a human-augmented site.
Critical notations provide specific warnings: PRESRR signifies rapidly rising pressure and potential low-level wind shear, while P0000 reports precipitation amounts, with higher values (e.g., P0020+) suggesting standing water on runways.
Additional codes include CAVOK (Europe) for specific good ceiling and visibility conditions, NATO airfield weather color codes (Europe) often associated with IMC, and a "$" at the end of a report signaling that the station requires maintenance.

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A METAR report ending in A01 or A02 is an automated station. A01 means no precipitation discriminator exists, so precipitation type cannot be reported. A02 means a precipitation discriminator does exist. The absence of A01 or A02 tells you the site is human augmented.