NextGen Live: Building The Radar

Chief Meteorologist David Payne unveiled our new dual pol weather radar -- the NextGen Live.

"This system is the best commercial system in the world," said John Ellis, Program Manager.

We traveled to Huntsville, Alabama where engineers at Baron Services spent the past year building us the most sophisticated weather radar on the planet.

"Our goal is to provide you with the tools to be able to detect and track everything with certainty," said Bob Dreisewerd, Baron Chief Development Officer.

Now we can track everything with certainty. The radar arrived and our engineers spent several weeks putting it all together then lifting it onto the tower, where it's fired up ready to track Oklahoma weather. With one million watts of power, we can now see storms farther out than ever before. It also gives us the highest resolution and speed of any television radar in the state, even over the National Weather Service.

"The typical National Weather Service radar updates at the most frequent, every 90 seconds but can be as much as 10 to 12 minutes old, you're going to be able to run this radar up to four times a minute," said Dreisewerd.

NextGen Live gives us live data on the storm with no delay.