ICE LOADS ON A LATTICE TOWER ESTIMATED BY WEATHER STATION DATA

Atmospheric ice loads are a major design criterion of tall structures in cold regions. In this paper the possibility to derive the design ic e loads using analysis of meteorological observations made routinely a t a weather station is studied. Ice loads calculated by extrapolating weather station data and using simplistic ice loading and unloading mo dels are compared with those measured on a 323-m-height lattice TV tow er. The comparison is made cumulatively in 3-h intervals over seven wi nter periods. The results show reasonable agreement in the time of the icing events and in overall loads. In the cases where the cumulative ice loads differ, the discrepancies are mostly due to incorrectly pred icted unloading events. This study points out the importance of on-sit e temperature data for successfully estimating cumulative ice loads ov er long cold periods.