Neglect in the measurement of high-altitude moisture by a rawinsonde instrumentation can affect radiation transfer calculations hence, impacts climate model physics. Before, it was intentionally excluded from most rawinsonde data assimilation, but this has cost much in todays radiosonde hygristor design. When rawinsonde operators replaced the older version with the upgraded ones in the Vaisala system, most of them did not change the instrumentation software to allow the moisture data to enter the global data collection. From an intentional restriction of uncalibrated data, this become an unintentional restriction of calibrated data. Addressing the problem, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) contacted the Vaisala system manufacturer who quickly responded by incorporating a default lower temperature limit of -100°C in all new software versions. They also began publishing alerts to users of their system worldwide. Because of this incident, there is a need for further scrutiny of data acquisition processes in both operational and research realms.
