EUROPEAN CENTRE FOR MEDIUM-RANGE WEATHER
FORECASTS ORDERS CRAY T3D MASSIVELY PARALLEL
PROCESSING SYSTEM

EAGAN, Minn., Oct.  19, 1993 -- Cray Research, Inc. (NYSE:CYR)
announced today that the European Centre for Medium-Range
Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) has ordered a CRAY T3D massively
parallel processing system.  The CRAY T3D system will be
closely coupled with a CRAY Y-MP2E parallel vector
supercomputer system also ordered by ECMWF.  Both systems 
are scheduled to be installed at the Centre's Reading, England
operations in mid-1994.

ECMWF has ordered a CRAY T3D MCA64-8, a 64-processor, air-
cooled system.  Terms were not disclosed.  This is one of the
nine initial orders referred to in the Sept. 27 CRAY T3D
product announcement.  

ECMWF will use the CRAY T3D to develop new forecasting
models that take advantage of MPP technology, and also to run
the Centre's ensemble prediction system.  This system is used
to generate forecasts provided to 18 national weather services
throughout Europe.

In ensemble forecasting, meteorologists run multiple versions
of a forecasting model, varying the data describing initial
weather conditions with each run.  This extremely computation-
intensive technique is used to improve the accuracy of
forecasts by determining their sensitivity to variations in
initial weather conditions.

ECMWF currently runs the ensemble prediction system on a
CRAY C916 delivered in 1992, which will continue to serve as
ECMWF's main resource for most forecasting work.  ECMWF was
the first international customer for the CRAY C916, Cray's top-
of-the-line parallel vector system.

"Our customers have been pleased with the quality of the
forecasts generated by our ensemble prediction system and
would like us to run the model more frequently," said Dr.  David
Burridge, director of ECMWF.  "With the CRAY T3D, we hope to
increase the number of runs from the current three times a
week to seven times a week."

John F. Carlson, Cray Research chairman and CEO, said, "Our
partnership with ECMWF began in the late1970s when the
Centre took delivery of a CRAY 1, continued with several
subsequent deliveries, and now progresses to a new stage with
the Centre's order for the T3D.  We're pleased that we've been
able to meet the Centre's growing need for robust, reliable
supercomputing power to improve forecasting accuracy."

ECMWF is funded by 18 European states.

Cray Research creates the most powerful, highest-quality
computational tools for solving the world's most challenging
scientific and industrial problems.

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