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Aqua MODIS and AIRS, Aura MLS, and CloudSat SamplePlots

A part of the A-Train Data Depot mission is to facilitate quick previews of vertical profiles and horizontal swaths of measurements from different instruments, but collocated and placed on a common vertical and horizontal grid. Various science retrievals will be available, and in particulartemperature, humidity, and cloud top and optical parameters (pressures, effective particle radii, optical depth, etc.).  The images below are very early efforts towards that goal.

giovanni plots of izilda  During its brewing phase on March 23, the tropical depression Izilda revealed an interesting two-core convective system, clearly captured by the CloudSat's vertical profiles (left). In the next couple of days, the depression organized better, to reach Tropical Storm status with sustained winds of 60 miles/hr (see imagery from MODIS rapidfire). The snapshot on the left demonstrates the utility of the Giovanni web plotting tool to quickly preview data from such extreme events. The plot shows collocated data from MODIS, CloudSat, MLS, and AMSR-E. The plots of Relative Humidity with respect  to Ice (RHI), as well as Ice Water Content (IWC), from MLS indicate significantly enhanced atmospheric moisture overshooting the tropopause. Thanks to CloudSat, the source of the moisture is easy to collocate with and attribute to the storm. Water vapor is the most potent greenhouse gas, and its concentration will only grow if global temperatures keep rising.
Hurricane Gustav, September 1.

Unlike Hurricane Katrina (2005), Hurricane Gustav (2008) made the landfall as category 2, and spared New Orleans by passing 66 miles west of it. Katrina stayed as category 5 for about 15 hours,with pressures as low as 902 mb, and was of category 4 just before making landfall. This Google Earth KMZ file shows MODIS/Aqua image of Gustav from September 1, 2008, and contains Gustav's (red line, past and projected as of Sep. 2) and Katrina's tracks (black line) for comparision. MODIS data are from the NASA's Direct Readout.
Hurricane Fay, August 20,2008

Tropical Storm Fay did not develop into hurricane, but its slow speed caused heavy floodings in Florida. Data from MODIS and AMSR-E instruments on board of Aqua are combined in this KMZ file for instantaneous joint review of true-color clouds imagery (MODIS) and retrieved rain-rates (AMSR-E). A snapshot from the KMZ is shown on left. The red line represents Fay's track.
Hurricane Dolly on July 22

The Atlantic hurricane season started early in 2008, with the tropical storm Arthur recorded on May 31. By July 22,hurricane Dolly was the fourth tropical storm, and this is how MODIS/Aqua saw it on that day. This image can be interactively viewed in Google Earth by downloading the KMZ file. The red line represents Dolly's track.

MODIS and CloudSat see trop storm Arthur

 The first Atlantic Tropical Storm for 2008, Arthur, was recorded on May 31. ATDD and Giovanni can produce CloudSat and CALIPSO profiles previews in the Google Earth's KMZ format.
Stratospheric cloud over the south pole, A-Train reconfiguration...Read more
CloudSat, CALIPSO, MODIS, OMI, and AIRS over Hurricane Ileana

Hurricane Ileana
On August 23, 2006, CloudSat and CALIPSO flew exactly over the eye of Hurricane Ileana, off the Baja peninsula coast. Other A-Train instruments - MODIS and AIRS on Aqua, and OMI on Aura - glanced over the hurricane as well. The upper image depicts profiles of CloudSat reflectivities (dBZ) calculated from the Level 1B product, 1B-CPR, that have been released by CIRA, Colorado State University. The lower image depicts provisional data from CALIPSO lidar, CALIOP, in particular Level 1B profiles of total attenuated backscatter at 532 nm, under initial release by LaRC/NASA. Overplotted lines represent different cloud pressures as retrieved by MODIS, AIRS and OMI algorithms.
MODIS, AIRS, and CloudSat over hurricane Ernesto

Hurricane Ernesto
MODIS, AIRS and CloudSat flew exactly over the hurricane eye on August 29, 2006. The CloudSat track relative to MODSI and AIRS swath is indicated as a yellow straight line in the imagery. CloudSat image courtesy of CIRA.

Access -- Expedited CALIPSO

Images and KMZ for Expedited CALIPSO

Near Real-time Expedited CALIPSO
This site contains browse images and Google Earth KMZ files of the total 532 nm attenuated backscatter signal (the sum of the 532 nm parallel and perpendicular return signals), the perpendicular 532 nm attenuated backscatter signal, and the total 1064 nm attenuated backscatter signal from CALIOP, the CALIPSO lidar. More images and KMZ files.

 

 

 

 

 

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  • Last updated: Sep 28, 2009 03:42 PM ET