Since ancient times, people have been interested in the weather: why do certain changes in the atmosphere occur? They kept diaries of observations of natural phenomena, tried to predict them. The dependence of mankind on the weather is so deeply rooted in the past that in ancient stories there are stories of floods that destroyed entire villages or droughts that lead to famine and the death of entire peoples on Earth. The desire of people to predict, including natural phenomena, according to scientists, was one of the driving forces of the development and evolution of mankind on Earth.
Since a person constantly feels changes in the weather, attempts to predict the weather have been made for a long time. The practical activity of people demanded to explain and predict the behavior of the atmosphere. Attempts at scientifically based weather forecasting began only in the XVIII century. after the invention of measuring instruments and the discovery of physical laws.
Changes in the atmosphere, and hence the weather, determine the dynamic and physical processes occurring in the atmosphere, as well as the interaction of the atmosphere with the adjacent environment: the surface of land, ocean and ice. Weather forecasts are of the greatest importance to ensure the safety of people. The only way to reduce the damage from the destructive effects of dangerous weather events is to study the nature of their occurrence and predict them.
The only one in the Republic that trains meteorologists is the Department of Meteorology and Hydrology of the Al-Farabi Kazakh National University. The Department of Meteorology was opened on September 1, 1962. The first head of the Department of Meteorology was Ph.D., Associate Professor. Kozhenkova Z.P. The first set of students in the specialty "Meteorology" was made in 1960, the first graduation of meteorological engineers took place in 1965.
Due to the structural changes in the Kazakh National University named after Al-Farabi, since September 2011, a new department has been organized at the Faculty of Geography and Environmental Management – the Department of Meteorology and Hydrology. It was formed on the basis of the merger of the Departments of Meteorology and Hydrology of the land. The department has a training and laboratory meteorological center (ULMC), which includes: a training meteorological station, training laboratories for meteorology and radiometeorology and climate change, a distance learning system center (EDS) for the National hydrometeorological services of Central Asia (NGMS CA), a grant from the World Bank.
Meteorologists work at meteorological stations and posts, in the research units of Kazhydromet, the Ministry of Defense and Kazselezashchita, Kazaeronavigation and the Institute of Geography. Meteorologists also work in private companies providing forecasts for aviation, agriculture, and construction.
The training of highly qualified meteorological engineers is the most important task of the Department of Meteorology and Hydrology. Making weather forecasts is the most difficult direction, which is given a lot of attention at the department. Currently, the following courses are taught by the teachers of the department in Russian and Kazakh: aviation meteorology, meteorology and climatology, radiometeorology, aerology, environmental problems in hydrometeorology, hydrometeorological monitoring, GIS in meteorology, atmospheric pollution and protection, long-term weather forecasts, climatology, general atmospheric circulation and long-term weather forecasts, general meteorology, dynamic meteorology, modern statistical methods in meteorology, the structure of cyclones- and anticyclogenesis in the Northern Hemisphere, physical meteorology, optics and atmospheric electricity, physics of clouds and precipitation, current problems of agrometeorological forecasts, physics of the upper atmosphere, synoptic meteorology, regional synoptic meteorology, methods of climate processing, special methods of weather forecasting, special methods of weather forecasting for aviation).
Teachers of the department together with students conduct scientific work on the study of the patterns of formation, distribution and dynamics of dangerous meteorological phenomena and processes on the territory of the Republic of Kazakhstan, which can lead to significant losses in economic sectors, and sometimes to emergency situations. The research covers a wide range of issues: from studying the conditions for the formation of some dangerous weather phenomena – thunderstorms, convective clouds, strong winds, extreme temperatures and precipitation – to solving applied problems, for example, assessing the potential for pollution of the territory of Kazakhstan, climate change trends, the available potential of solar energy; studying the thermal regime and features of macrocirculatory conditions that form the fields of extreme air temperatures, extreme precipitation in Kazakhstan; analysis of the wind regime in the lower layer of the atmosphere. Investigation of the problems of the general circulation of the atmosphere on the territory of the republic, leading to the occurrence of dangerous weather phenomena. The scientific work of the department always takes place in close cooperation with the scientific and production departments of Kazhydromet.
Gulnar ORAKOVA,
Senior Lecturer, Department of Meteorology and Hydrology
