{"id":222,"date":"2011-10-14T18:56:23","date_gmt":"2011-10-14T18:56:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rammb.cira.colostate.edu\/research\/goes-r\/proving_ground\/blog\/?p=222"},"modified":"2026-03-06T09:05:41","modified_gmt":"2026-03-06T16:05:41","slug":"modis-snowcloud-discriminator-example","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/proving-ground-blog\/2011\/10\/14\/modis-snowcloud-discriminator-example\/","title":{"rendered":"MODIS Snow\/Cloud Discriminator Example"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"960\" height=\"480\" src=\"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/proving-ground-blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2011\/10\/miller_snow_example6.gif\" alt=\"fading image example above demonstrates the MODIS Snow\/Cloud Discriminator product, coupled with the true color product which presents the scene as &quot;color-vision imagery&quot; but does not discriminate snow from clouds\" class=\"wp-image-224\" title=\"MODIS Snow\/Cloud Example\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As part of the GOES-R Satellite Proving Ground, NASA MODIS data are being used to preview the kinds of snow detection capabilities that will become available from the GOES-R ABI.&nbsp; The fading image example above demonstrates the MODIS Snow\/Cloud Discriminator product, coupled with the true color product which presents the scene as &#8220;color-vision imagery&#8221; but does not discriminate snow from clouds.&nbsp; The discriminator product, presented here as enhanced imagery,&nbsp; takes advantage of shortwave infrared bands currently not availble to GOES to present high clouds in magenta, mid\/low and overlapping level clouds in orange\/yellow, snow cover in white, and clear-sky over land as green (water bodies, when present, appear as blue).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>On the left side of this example is an image from 9\/25\/2011 centered over Colorado near the end of the &#8216;water year&#8217; (which runs from Oct 1 to Sep 30, and corresponds roughly to the storage cycle of snowpack in the Rockies).&nbsp; On the right side is an image from 10\/9\/2011, entering the new water year and shortly after one of the first Colorado high-country snow events.&nbsp; The 9\/25\/2011 fading loop is MODIS true color imagery in which no snow cover is discerned (with only a few broken cumulus clouds over the mountains).&nbsp; After the snow event, a large portion of the domain is filled with what might be low clouds, high clouds, or snow (right).&nbsp; Using the true color imagery alone, a forecaster would have trouble discriminating between the clouds and snow in this complex scene.&nbsp; However, the snow\/cloud discriminator product makes the identification less ambiguous.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>With GOES-R, this capability will be further improved by virtue of the high temporal refresh rate (5 minute, standard), enabling detection of snowfields that are currently obscured by cloud cover.&nbsp; Through the Proving Ground, forecasters are able to familiarize themselves with and evaluate the capabilities of improved snow\/cloud discriminators in anticipation of operation commission of the GOES-R ABI later this decade.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As part of the GOES-R Satellite Proving Ground, NASA MODIS data are being used to preview the kinds of snow detection capabilities that will become available from the GOES-R ABI.&nbsp; The fading image example above demonstrates the MODIS Snow\/Cloud Discriminator product, coupled with the true color product which presents the scene as &#8220;color-vision imagery&#8221; but [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-222","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-modis-snowcloud-discriminator"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/proving-ground-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/proving-ground-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/proving-ground-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/proving-ground-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/proving-ground-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=222"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/proving-ground-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1293,"href":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/proving-ground-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222\/revisions\/1293"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/proving-ground-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=222"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/proving-ground-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=222"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rammb2.cira.colostate.edu\/proving-ground-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=222"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}