CIMSS-NOAA Weekly Report [ Archive ]

CIMSS AND ASPB WEEKLY HIGHLIGHTS FOR THE WEEK ENDING AUGUST 18, 2023

DATA, INFORMATION, AND USE-INSPIRED SCIENCE:

FUTURE OUTLOOK:

AWARDS AND RECOGNITION:

TRAVEL AND MEETINGS:

ProbSevere LightningCast presentation at NWS meeting: John Cintineo of the Cooperative Institute for Meteorological Satellite Studies (CIMSS) gave an invited presentation at the National Weather Service's (NWS) Science Operations Officer and Development/Operations Hydrologist (SOO/DOH) meeting in Denver, Colorado. The talk demonstrated how LightningCast output can be used in NWS operations tasks such as terminal aerodrome forecasts (TAFs) and impacts-based decision support services (IDSS) to NWS's core partners. ProbSevere LightningCast is a deep-learning model that leverages the rich information from GOES-R ABI to predict the probability of lightning in the next 60 minutes. It has been used by many NWS offices in an experimental fashion the last two years and will be transitioned to NESDIS operations. (J Cintineo, CIMSS, cintineo@wisc.edu; M. Pavolonis, NOAA/NESDIS/STAR, michael.pavolonis@noaa.gov; J. Sieglaff, CIMSS, justin.sieglaff@ssec.wisc.edu)

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Figure: Example output of ProbSevere LightningCast contours in AWIPS2 (left) and time series output (on the internet).

TRAINING AND EDUCATION:

STAR Lapenta Internship: Improving Snow Squall Situational Awareness Using GOES-16 Cloud Products: D'andre Tillman - a rising fourth year undergraduate student at Pennsylvania State University - recently completed his summer William Lapenta Internship with NOAA/NESDIS/STAR. Mark Kulie (STAR) served as D'andre's mentor on his research project titled "Convective Snow Quantitative Precipitation Estimation Using GOES, NEXRAD, and Ground-Based Observations." D'andre first created a snow squall "climatology" map based on historical Snow Squall Warnings issued by National Weather Service (NWS) Weather Forecast Offices (WFO). He then developed a Python-based method to merge GOES-derived cloud products, NEXRAD observations, and in situ visibility observations into a common gridded database for a multi-year database of convective snow squall events in Pennsylvania. He also studied multivariate relationships between GOES-derived cloud microphysical/optical properties, surface visibility, and snowfall intensity using the merged database. These foundational research efforts will stimulate further applied research to develop a GOES-based machine learning algorithm that will take advantage of the merged GOES/NEXRAD/in situ observational training database to create a near real time snowfall intensity and/or hazardous snow squall threat assessment product that will increase National Weather Service forecasters' situational awareness for snow squall events. D'andre received valuable encouragement and feedback from State College, PA and Burlington, VT NWS WFO and NOAA/NWS/Environmental Modeling Center personnel while pursuing this project. He will present his Lapenta Internship project at the upcoming American Meteorological Society Annual Meeting that will be held in January 2024. (M. Kulie, E/RA2, 608-263-6583, mark.kulie@noaa.gov)

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Figure: Total number of Snow Squall Warnings issued by NWS WFO's between January 2018 and June 2023. NWS WFO warning data compiled by the Iowa State University Iowa Environmental Mesonet website and associated mapping tools were used to create this figure.

MEDIA INTERACTIONS AND REQUESTS:

SOCIAL MEDIA AND BLOG Posts:

SSEC and CIMSS Scientists in the news: Scientists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison (UW) Space Science and Engineering Center (SSEC) and the Cooperative Institute for Meteorological Satellite Studies (CIMSS) provide expert interviews, imagery and case studies to promote science. This week: 1) CIMSS Scientist Jason Otkin provided email comments to Seth Borenstein at the Associated Press about the fire in Maui and how flash drought played a role in its occurrence. This article was also published on many other news sites: https://bit.ly/3saP9tM. 2) CIMSS Scientist Jason Otkin sent email comments to Wen Qiao at the China National Business Daily newspaper (60 million daily readers) about the fire in Maui and how weather and climate influenced its occurrence and behavior. The article has English and Chinese versions. http://www.nbdpress.com/articles/2023-08-17/49632.html and http://www.nbd.com.cn/articles/2023-08-16/2963469.html. 2) CIMSS Satellite Blog contributors Scott Lindstrom, Scott Bachmeier, and Rick Kohrs published these case studies: "Crater Creek Fire in British Columbia produces a pyrocumulonimbus cloud" (August 16), "SUVI data in three dimensions" (August 11). Read more at the CIMSS Satellite Blog: https://cimss.ssec.wisc.edu/satellite-blog/. (S. Lindstrom, CIMSS, S. Bachmeier, CIMSS, R. Kohrs, SSEC, E. Verbeten, SSEC)

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Figure: SSEC Satellite Data Service is using McIDAS-X and HereGOES software packages to create imagery from the GOES-R Solar Ultra-Violet Imager (SUVI) instrument that monitors solar ultraviolet activity.

PUBLICATIONS:

Manuscript published on reanalyses tropical water vapor evaluation using AHI: A manuscript titled, "Consistency of Tropospheric Water Vapor between Reanalyses and Himawari-8/AHI Measurements over East Asia", was published in Advances in Atmospheric Sciences. This study uses AHI measurements to evaluate the tropical water vapor over East Asia from 6 different reanalyses datasets: ERA-Interim, ERA5, CFSR, MERRA-2, JRA-55, and CRA. The citation is: Di, D., Li, J., Xue, Y., Min, M., Li, Z. Consistency of Tropospheric Water Vapor between Reanalyses and Himawari-8/AHI Measurements over East Asia. Adv. Atmos. Sci. (2023), https://doi.org/10.1007/s00376-023-2332-2. (Z. Li, CIMSS, 608-890-1982).

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Figure: (a–c) Annual cycles of BT simulations from the six reanalysis datasets and AHI observations for band 08, band 09 and band 10, respectively. (d–f) Annual cycles of mean BTD between simulations and observations for band 08, band 09 and band 10, respectively.

OTHER: