In 1961, the Air Force Cambridge Research Laboratories (AFCRL) put into operation a 5-cm pulsed Doppler radar called Porcupine that was adapted for meteorological measurements. Rogers (1990) reviews the history of early efforts to apply Doppler techniques in radar meteorology. Thus, operational use of Doppler weather radar had to await the development of pulse-Doppler technology (that provided the range capability) for the extraction of moments such as mean radial velocity and spectrum width from pulse Doppler spectra and techniques for interpreting the velocity patterns observable with a single radar.

The inability of a CW radar system to determine the range to the target was a serious impediment to operational application of this capability. Although plagued by noisy magnetrons and attenuation by rain, these early systems were capable of detecting 205-mph (∼30 km h −1) winds near a tornado vortex ( Holmes and Smith 1958 Rockney 1960 Smith and Holmes 1961). This early effort involved conducting tests on an experimental, 3-cm, continuous-wave (CW) Doppler weather radar system at Wichita Falls, Texas, and Wichita, Kansas. The Weather Bureau followed up on this potential beginning in fall 1956 and continued through 1960. This offered a potential for remote measurement of wind speeds. The wartime Rad Lab investigators recognized the possibility that radar systems could employ the Doppler effect to measure target velocities. Advances made by Doppler radar meteorological research

Wichita falls texas doppler radar