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CRAS Realtime Forecast Products for South America

Here is today's 72-hour forecast, initialized at 12 UTC on 19 Jul 08. These forecast products are produced by the CIMSS Regional Assimilation System (CRAS) model running at 48km resolution. The daily 00 and 12 UTC forecast results are usually available at approximately 04:45 UTC and 16:45 UTC respectively. DISCLAIMER.

CRASNOTE:

The 12 hour CRAS spinnup used for this forecast is assimilating 3-layer precipitable water and cloud top pressure retrieved from the GOES-10 sounder. The latest NCEP Global Forecast System (GFS) forecast is used for boundary conditions.


CRAS 12-HR ASSIMILATION MAPS

Fcst Sfc/500 hPa Surface Surface PBL Surface 850 hPa 700 hPa 500 hPa 300 hPa Image Image
12-hr Loop pcp/mslp/Dz spd/dir rainrate PBL RH total PW T/wind VV/wind vort/wind spd/dir 11um 6.7um

CRAS SOUTH AMERICA FORECAST MAPS

Fcst Surface Surface PBL 850 hPa 700 hPa 500 hPa 300 hPa Surface Surface Image Image
Initial pcp/mslp/Dz spd/dir PBL RH T/wind VV/wind vort/wind spd/dir Total PW rainrate 11um 6.7um
6 hr pcp/mslp/Dz spd/dir PBL RH T/wind VV/wind vort/wind spd/dir Total PW rainrate 11um 6.7um
12 hr pcp/mslp/Dz spd/dir PBL RH T/wind VV/wind vort/wind spd/dir Total PW rainrate 11um 6.7um
18 hr pcp/mslp/Dz spd/dir PBL RH T/wind VV/wind vort/wind spd/dir Total PW rainrate 11um 6.7um
24 hr pcp/mslp/Dz spd/dir PBL RH T/wind VV/wind vort/wind spd/dir Total PW rainrate 11um 6.7um
36 hr pcp/mslp/Dz spd/dir PBL RH T/wind VV/wind vort/wind spd/dir Total PW rainrate 11um 6.7um
48 hr pcp/mslp/Dz spd/dir PBL RH T/wind VV/wind vort/wind spd/dir Total PW rainrate 11um 6.7um
60 hr pcp/mslp/Dz spd/dir PBL RH T/wind VV/wind vort/wind spd/dir Total PW rainrate 11um 6.7um
72 hr pcp/mslp/Dz spd/dir PBL RH T/wind VV/wind vort/wind spd/dir Total PW rainrate 11um 6.7um
Loop pcp/mslp/Dz spd/dir PBL RH T/wind VV/wind vort/wind spd/dir Total PW rainrate 11um 6.7um
Fcst Surface Surface PBL 850 hPa 700 hPa 500 hPa 300 hPa Surface Surface Image Image


The purpose of the CRAS is to test the use of satellite observations in a numerical prediction model. The quality of a numerical forecast depends on having accurate observations of the environment to define the forecast model's initial state. Here is a list of the observations that are used to generate this CRAS forecast:
    3-layer precipitable water (mm) from the GOES-10 sounder (soon)
    Cloud-top pressure (hPa) and effective cloud amount (%) from the GOES-12 imager
    Surface temperature (C), dew points (C) and winds (m/s)
    Sea surface temperature (C) and sea ice coverage (%) from NCEP rtg analysis

This CRAS forecast is nested within the National Centers for Environmental Prediction's (NCEP) Global Forecast System (GFS) operational forecast.

Publications referring to CRAS


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Please refer questions or comments to the CRASmaster at cras@ssec.wisc.edu.