MTSAT High Density Winds (AWIPS menu)

TECHNICAL IMPLEMENTATION NOTICE 08-61
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE HEADQUARTERS WASHINGTON DC
317 PM EDT FRI AUG 1 2008 

SUBJECT:  NESDIS HIGH DENSITY GEOSTATIONARY WINDS TO BE
          ADDED TO SBN/NOAAPORT: EFFECTIVE OCTOBER 15 2008 

EFFECTIVE WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 15 2008...BEGINNING AT APPROXIMATELY
1500 COORDINATED UNIVERSAL TIME /UTC/...THE NATIONAL
ENVIRONMENTAL SATELLITE...DATA...AND INFORMATION SERVICE /NESDIS/
AND NWS START DISSEMINATING HIGH DENSITY GEOSTATIONARY /MTSAT/
WIND PRODUCTS VIA SBN/NOAAPORT.

THE MTSAT WINDS /FROM THE JAPANESE SATELLITE/ WILL AUGMENT THE
CURRENT GOES EAST AND WEST HIGH DENSITY WINDS OVER SPARSE DATA
REGIONS...MOST BENEFITING THE ALASKA AND PACIFIC REGIONS AND THE
AVIATION WEATHER CENTER /AWC/.

Coverage of MTSAT High Density Winds vs GOES High Density Winds

A comparison of the areal coverage of the MTSAT vs the GOES high density winds is shown on the Pacific Mercator scale  (above) and Northern Hemisphere scale (below). The MTSAT high density winds will be available north of the Equator every 3 hours (at 02, 05, 08, 11, 14, 17, 20, and 23 UTC), and south of the Equator every 6 hours (at 00, 06, 12, and 18 UTC).

Coverage of MTSAT High Density Winds vs GOES High Density Winds

With the AWIPS cursor sampling function activated, the user will be able to display the valid time, the type of satellite imagery used to derive a particular AMV (Visible, InfraRed, shortwave InfraRed, or Water Vapor), the pressure of the height assignment for that AMV, and the direction/speed of that AMV (below). The wind vectors can be color-coded according to pressure layers (as shown below), or by AMV type (IR, Water Vapor, Visible, or 3.9 µm shortwave IR). Targets are tracked on three consecutive satellite images in order to calculate the direction and speed of each AMV.

MTSAT High Density Winds

These MTSAT winds available on AWIPS should be very similar to those derived using GOES data, since NESDIS is using the same AMV software (which was developed at CIMSS) for both satellites. For more details about the derivation and application of satellite-derived atmospheric motion vector products, see the SHyMet GOES High Density Winds lesson.

Reference:

Velden, C.S. et al., 2005: Recent Innovations in Deriving Winds from Meteorological Satellites. Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc., 86, 205-223

– Updated 29 January 2009 –

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GOES-11 10.7 µm IR images

Very cold air was becoming established across the interior of Alaska during the last few days of December 2008. AWIPS images of the 4-km resolution GOES-11 10.7 µm IR channel (above) showed large areas exhibiting very cold IR brightness temperatures (colder than -40º C, darker blue color enhancement) which were increasing in areal coverage as the surface temperatures continued to drop. The coldest air temperature measured in Alaska on 30 December 2008 was -49º C (-57º F) at O’Brien Creek; the temperature at the Fairbanks airport dropped to -41º C (41º F), with the coldest location in the Fairbanks urban corridor (the Woodsmoke subdivision at North Pole) reaching -43º C (-46º F).

A closer look using 1-km resolution 10.8 µm IR data from the AVHRR instrument on the NOAA series of polar-orbiting satellites (below) showed remarkable detail in the cold surface temperatures, whose patterns were strongly influenced by elevation. Due to cold air drainage, the coldest surface IR temperatures (indicated by the darkest blue color enhancement) were found in lower elevations such as river valleys and the Yukon Flats area of interior Alaska — note that the Yukon Flats region (located in the lower right quadrant of the images) exhibited a progressively darker blue enhancement on these 3 IR images as the surface temperatures plummeted during that time period. The coldest IR brightness temperature seen on the 15:57 UTC image was 222º K (-51º C, or -60º F) — and the air temperature at Fort Yukon was -46º C (-51º F) at that particular time.

NOAA-15 / NOAA-17 / NOAA-18 AVHRR 10.8 µm IR images

With such cold temperatures becoming established up in Alaska, parts of the Lower 48 states should be on notice for a possible arctic outbreak in the coming weeks…

— 04 JANUARY 2009 UPDATE —

The coldest temperatures during this particular streak of cold temperatures occurred on 04 January 2009, when -54º C (-65º F) was reported at O’Brien Creek. A NOAA-17 AVHRR 10.8 µm IR image (below) indicated that IR brightness temperatures in the Yukon Flats region (located in the southeastern portion of the image) were as cold as -52º C (-62º F) at 20:51 UTC (11:51 AM local time).

NOAA-17 AVHRR 10.8 µm IR image

— 10 January 2009 Update —

The coldest official temperatures recorded in Alaska during this 15-day-long cold spell were -56º C (-68º F) at O’Brien Creek (on 10 January) and at Chicken (on 08 January). In Fairbanks, the temperature remained below -40º C/F for a 24-hour period on 05-06 January.

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GOES-13 6.5 µm water vapor images

A potent shortwave trough was propagating eastward across the Upper Midwest region on 29 December 2008, and AWIPS images of the GOES-13 6.5 µm “water vapor channel” (above) showed a well-defined signature of mid-level dry air (yellow colors) moving rapidly east-southeastward over parts of Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Lower Michigan during the morning and afternoon hours. MODIS 6.7 µm water vapor channel images from consecutive overpasses of the Terra and Aqua satellites (below) showed a similar signature, albeit with a slightly larger areal coverage of the “dry air” pocket.

MODIS 6.7 µm water vapor images

A comparison of the three GOES-13 Sounder water vapor channels (6.5 µm, 7.0 µm, and 7.4 µm) with the GOES-13 Imager 6.5 µm water vapor channel (below) revealed that a more distinct “dry air signature” (indicated by the brighter yellow colors) was evident when examining the Sounder 7.0 µm and 7.4 µm channel imagery — those water vapor channel’s weighting functions peak at lower altitudes than either the Sounder 6.5 µm or the Imager 6.5 µm water vapor channels.

GOES-13 Sounder and Imager water vapor channel data

Note that the core of this dry air pocket appeared to have moved over the NOAA Wind Profiler site at Blue River in southwestern Wisconsin (station identifier BLRW3) after about 15:00 UTC — and the wind profiler data at that site (below) revealed a nice “descending jet” signature from the late morning into the early afternoon hours, with wind speeds of 100 knots and higher (red colors) deepening and moving downward from around the 10 km altitude at 13:00 UTC to near the 4-6 km altitude by 20:00 UTC. As the high momentum aloft (associated with the fast-moving mid-tropospheric dry air seen on the water vapor imagery) was gradually transferred downward to lower altitudes, the surface winds gusted to 51 mph at Austin in southern Minnesota (at 15:15 UTC),  47 mph at Sheboygan in eastern Wisconsin (at 18:24 UTC), and 65 mph at Charlevoix in northern Lower Michigan (at 00:25 UTC).

Blue River, Wisconsin wind profiler data

The core of the mid-tropospheric dry air had moved over southern Lower Michigan by late afternoon, and the GOES-13 Sounder and Imager water vapor channel weighting functions calculated using the 00:00 UTC rawinsonde data from Detroit (below) indicated that the layer of radiation being detected by the Sounder 7.4 µm channel was peaking at a very low altitude (red plot), with a significant component of that radiation likely coming from the surface.

Detroit, Michigan GOES-13 water vapor channel weighting functions

It is interesting to note that an animation of the GOES-13 Sounder 7.4 µm water vapor channel imagery with the map overlay removed (below) displayed a clear signature of the outline of portions of Lake Superior and Lake Michigan after the driest air had moved over the region — the strong thermal signature of the “cold land / warmer water” surface boundary was able to reach the satellite, since there was very little middle and upper tropospheric water vapor present to attenuate the signal.

GOES-13 Sounder 7.4 µm water vapor images (with map overlay removed)

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GOES-11 10.7 µm InfraRed (IR) images

A strong thunderstorm which produced heavy rain and frequent lightning was apparently a factor in triggering a power blackout that affected the Hawaiian island of Oahu for at least 12 hours, beginning on the evening of 26 December 2008 — in fact, this was the first time all of Oahu had lost power since October 2006, when a 6.7 magnitude earthquake shook the Hawaiian Islands and knocked out power on Oahu and parts of other islands for up to two days. GOES-11 10.7 µm IR images (above) showed the rapid development — and the subsequent rapid dissipation — of this thunderstorm over Oahu (the island located at the center of the images), which formed around 04:00 UTC on 27 December (6 PM local time on 26 December). The IR cloud top brightness temperatures quickly cooled to a minimum value of -45º C (violet color enhancement) at 04:30 UTC, but then cloud top temperatures increased to values warmer than -40º C as the storm moved northwestward away from the island of Oahu by 06:00 UTC.

An upper-level low had been located to the east of the Hawaiian Islands for several days, and GOES-11 6.7 µm water vapor images (below) showed that this low moved slowly westward during the 25-27 December period. Also note the roll-up of smaller cyclonic “vorticies” along the northern edge of the moisture field of the upper low — CIMSS water vapor winds products indicated that these vorticies were forming in an environment of low wind shear that existed over the northern periphery of the low (and the wind shear tendency product showed that shear had been decreasing over that region during the previous 24 hours).

GOES-11 6.7 µm water vapor images

An AWIPS image of the CIMSS MIMIC Total Precipitable Water product (below) indicated that TPW values were certainly not as high over the Hawaiian Islands as those seen farther to the south in the region of the Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ), but PW values in excess of 40 mm (green to yellow color enhancement) were in place as the upper low moved westward across the region. Over the Big Island of Hawaii, several locations had received more than 10 inches of rainfall in 24 hours, with Waiakea Uka reporting 13.15 inches (and about a foot of snow fell at the higher elevations of Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa).

MIMIC Total Precipitable Water (TPW)

In advance of the arrival of the higher TPW values associated with the upper-level low, a pocket of dry air had been moving southwestward across the Hawaiian Islands on 25 December. It is interesting to note that GOES-11 water vapor images (below, with the map overlay removed) revealed the presence of “standing waves” due to the strong northeasterly winds interacting with the high terrain of the island chain.

GOES-11 6.7 µm water vapor images (with map overlay removed)

The GOES-11 water vapor channel weighting functions (below) showed that the mid-tropospheric dry air present over Hilo, Hawaii at 12:00 UTC on 25 December had the effect of shifting the peak of the water vapor weighting function downward, allowing features at a lower altitude to be resolved on the water vapor imagery (compared to what would be viewed at that location if a slightly cooler but more moist “US Standard Atmosphere” were in place).

GOES-11 water vapor channel weighting functions

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