DIRECT READOUT APPLICATIONS USING

ATOVS

ANTHONY L. REALENOAA/NESDIS

OFFICE OF RESEARCH AND APPLICATIONS

POES (K-N`) Instruments

AVHRR

HIRS

SARR

AMSU

• May 1998:

The launch of NOAA-15 ushers in a new era in remote sensing…

Courtesy of Paul Menzel

NOAA POLAR OPERATIONAL SATELLITES

• NOAA-15 (1930 LST; no AVHRR, no AMSU-A channels 11, 13)

• NOAA-16 (1430 LST; AMSU-A Problems?)

• NOAA-17 (2230 LST; Fully Functional)

ATOVS ATMOSPHERIC RADIOMETER SOUNDERS

• High-resolution Infrared Radiation Sounder (HIRS); 20-channels @17km…..Clouds, clear-sky Temperature, Moisture, and Surface

• Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit-A (AMSU-A); 15-channels @50km…..All-sky Temperature, TPW, Cloud Water, and Surface

• Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit-B (AMSU-B); 5-channels @16km…..All-sky Moisture, and Surface

• Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR); 6-channels @1.0 km (LAC), 4.0 km (GAC)……Clouds, clear-sky Surface

POES Products

• Input for forecast weather models• 3-D measurements of temperature and

humidity• Cloud imagery• Sea surface temperature observations• Snow and ice cover• Vegetation index• Aerosol observations• Atmospheric ozone measurements• Fire detection and monitoring• Volcanic ash cloud tracking

Hurricane Floyd

Fires at Los AlamosCourtesy of Paul Menzel

• Products from ATOVS

Courtesy of Tony Reale

• Satellite vs. NWP departure fields help focus attention on important mesoscale features

CLOUDS AND MOISTURE

Fig 15

10

NOAA-15 polar orbiting satellite 3 channel composite view of hurricane Bonnie the morning of August 25

11

Hurricane Bonnie’s warm core revealed in temperature anomaly cross section derived using NOAA-15

Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit (AMSU) data

• Direct Readout

DIRECT READOUT PROCESSING

• MORE TIMELY• FULL DENSITY (ie, AVHRR “LAC”) • INDEPENDENCE• LOCAL INFLUENCES

• FEEDBACK TO NESDIS

ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE APPLICATIONS

• NUMERICAL WEATHER PREDICTION INITIALIZATION

• ENVIRONMENTAL MONITORING

• CLIMATE

• Ground Truth – Utilizing available RAOB Data

Courtesy of Tony Reale

Drought in South America

Most affected are Brazil, Paraguay, Argentina, and Uruguay

AVHRR data delineates areas of vegetation stress (Red areas)

Data provided to USDA (Foreign Agriculture Service)

Started in October 1999 and continues

Courtesy of Jim Purdom

• AMSU Hurricane Intensity Estimation

• AMSU (blue) / GOES (dashed red) relative viewing geometry

Courtesy of Paul Menzel

NOAA-15 AMSU-A T(C) 2332 UTC 11 Sep 99GOES-8 IR 2315 UTC 11 Sep 99

“Hurricane Floyd”

Education and

Training…

• Building bridges — transferring knowledge between scientific, academic, and operational communities

Users

VendorsScienceTeams

POES/NPOESS

Turning the pages to a new chapter in remote

sensing…

Photo Courtesy of NOAA Photo Library