GOES-16 data posted on this page are preliminary, non-operational data that are undergoing testing.

GOES-16 Visible imagery captured the erosion of near-surface clouds over Ohio on 21 March 2017. A benefit of the routine 5-minute imagery is that it allows better estimates of exactly when the low clouds will clear out. There is ample suggestion in the animation above of the presence of cirrus clouds. The GOES-16 ABI has a channel at 1.38 µm that is specifically designed to detect cirrus clouds because that is a region in the electromagnetic spectrum where strong water vapor absorption occurs. The animation of ‘cirrus channel’ imagery, below, confirms the presence of widespread cirrus clouds.

The MODIS instrument also has a similar near-infrared Cirrus spectral band — and a comparison of Terra MODIS Visible (0.65 µm) and Cirrus (1.375 µm) images at 1601 UTC is shown below.

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** The GOES-16 data posted on this page are preliminary, non-operational data and are undergoing testing. **

1-minute interval 0.5-km resolution GOES-16 Visible (0.64 µm) images (above; also available as a 130 Mbyte animated GIF) showed a cluster of thunderstorms that moved southeastward across Illinois and Indiana, producing a swath of hail as large as 2.75 inches in diameter (SPC storm reports) on 20 March 2017. The shadowing and textured signature of overshooting tops could be seen in the vicinity of many of the hail reports (hail sizes, red, are plotted in 1/100th of an inch; 275 = 2.75 inches).

On 21 March, a larger-scale outbreak of wind and hail-producing thunderstorms developed which primarily impacted parts of Tennessee, Georgia and South Carolina. Trees falling on homes were responsible for injuries and a fatality in Georgia, and hail as large as 3.0 inches occurred in South Carolina (SPC storm reports). As discussed on the Satellite Liaison Blog, the co-location of both Mesoscale Sectors provided images at 30-second intervals — GOES-16 Visible (0.64 µm) images (below; also available as a 168 Mbyte animated GIF) again displayed very detailed cloud-top structure which included overshooting tops and gravity waves.

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** The GOES-16 data posted on this page are preliminary, non-operational data and are undergoing testing. **

The ABI instrument on GOES-16 is able to scan 2 Mesoscale Sectors, each of which provides images at 1-minute intervals. For what was likely a prescribed burn in the Francis Marion National Forest (near the coast of South Carolina) on 19 March 2017, a comparison of 1 minute Mesoscale Sector GOES-16 and 15-30 minute Routine Scan GOES-13 Shortwave Infrared (3.9 µm) images (above; also available as a 50 Mbyte animated GIF) demonstrated the clear advantage of 1-minute imagery in terms of monitoring the short-term intensity fluctuations that are often exhibited by fire activity. In this case,  the intensity of the fire began to increase during 15:15-15:45 UTC — a time period when there was a 30-minute gap in routine scan imagery from GOES-13. The GOES-16 shortwave infrared brightness temperature then became very hot (red enhancement) beginning at 15:46:58 UTC, which again was not captured by GOES-13 — even on the 16:00 UTC and later images (however, this might be due to the more coarse 4-km spatial resolution of GOES-13, compared to the 2-km resolution of the shortwave infrared band on GOES-16). Similar short-term intensity fluctuations of a smaller fire (burning just to the southwest) were not adequately captured by GOES-13.

The corresponding GOES-16 vs GOES-13 Visible image comparison (below; also available as a 72 Mbyte animated GIF) also showed the advantage of 1-minute scans, along with the improved 0.5-km spatial resolution of the 0.64 µm spectral band on GOES-16 (which allowed brief pulses of pyrocumulus clouds to be seen developing over the fire source region).

 The rapid south-southeastward spread of the smoke plume could also be seen on true-color Red/Green/Blue (RGB) images from Terra/Aqua MODIS and Suomi NPP VIIRS, as viewed using RealEarth (below).

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The GOES-16 data posted on this page are preliminary, non-operational data and are undergoing testing.

One of the GOES-16 Band Difference Products available in AWIPS is shown above (click here for the same image with a default enhancement), the 8.4 µm – 11.2 µm ‘Cloud Phase’ Channel Difference. There has been considerable work showing a good correlation between the 8.4 µm – 11 µm brightness temperature difference and cloud-top phase. Click here for example. The key take-aways:

1. “Radiative transfer simulations indicate that the brightness temperature difference between the 8.5- and 11-micron bands (hereafter denoted as BTD[8.5-11]) tends to be positive in sign for ice clouds that have an infrared optical thickness greater than approximately 0.5. Water clouds of relatively high optical thickness tend to exhibit highly negative BTD[8.5-11] values of less than -2K.”
2. “Clear-sky BTD[8.5-11] values tend to be negative because the surface emittance at 8.5 microns tends to be much lower than at 11 microns, especially over non-vegetated surfaces.”
3. “Small particles tend to increase the BTD[8.5-11] values relative to large particles because of increased scattering.”

This Algorithm Theoretical Basis Document (ATBD) contains further information and references on the topic.

In the color enhancement above (generated using just 3 colors — blue, red and yellow, and easily changeable for those whose eyesight is color challenged), negative brightness temperature differences — ice clouds — are denoted by red to yellow values. Positive values are blue. Water-based clouds are white or light blue, ice clouds are red. Large Brightness Temperature Differences occur over the Desert southwest and strong negative values (blue in the enhancement) are present because of emissivity differences from the soil at the two wavelengths. The toggle below cycles through the Band Difference field, the 8.4 µm and 11.2 µm imagery, the upper level water vapor (6.19 µm), the cirrus channel (1.378 µm) and the Veggie channel (0.86 µm).  Click here for a toggle between the Cloud Phase Product and Water Vapor and Cirrus channels only (to highlight ice clouds), or here for a toggle between the Cloud Phase and Veggie Band (a band in which clouds composed of water droplets are visible).

One of the GOES-16 Baseline Products will be Cloud Phase. A beta version of this product should be flowing before the end of May. The ATBD for that product shows that both 8.4 µm and 11.2 µm data are used in its creation, and the channel difference shown here shows why.

Fact Sheets are available for the 8.4 µm and 11.2 µm Channels on GOES-16 from the GOES-R website.

AWIPS Notes: AWIPS sometimes mislabels the 8.4 µm channel as 8.5 µm. The Channel Difference field shows missing data where the brightness temperature difference field is exactly zero. Such points are apparent in the image above over Minnesota and North Dakota as black speckles.

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