Regional and Mesoscale Meteorology Branch

NOAA/NESDIS/PSDI/NDE/S-NPP Tropical Cyclone Algorithm: One upgrade and one major release (NPP_TC v1.3.4, 1.4.0) were developed, tested and migrated to the NDE development and test servers including 14 ATMS test cases. Release highlights include a workaround to incorrect MIRS ATMS netCDF scaling values and a migration/calibration from MIRS ATMS cloud liquid water (CLW) to liquid water path (LWP) and improved error code handling. The S-NPP TC products are being tested in real-time and will be briefed to the SPSRB shortly thereafter (est. August 2014). (S. Longmore, A. Schumacher, J. Dostalek)

NOAA/NESDIS/PSDI/AMSU Tropical Cyclone Algorithm: Real-time set-up and testing of AMSU TC version 1.1.1 is currently being performed at CIRA/NESDIS OSPO. (S. Longmore, J. Dostalek)

Atlantic Tropical Cyclone Dropsondes:  K. Musgrave organized and performed quality control on dropsondes released over Atlantic tropical cyclones during the 2012 and 2013 hurricane seasons.  Although created for the calibration and validation of the tropical cyclone products generated by CIRA, the dataset will likely prove useful for other studies.  (K. Musgrave, J. Dostalek, J. Knaff) 

HFIP Retrospective Testing Completed:  The retrospective testing of SPICE for inclusion in HFIP’s 2014 real-time demonstration was completed and turned in to the Developmental Testbed Center.  The testing included the 2011-2013 Atlantic and East Pacific hurricane seasons.  (K. Musgrave)

Tropical Cyclone Genesis Index Running in Real-time for 2014 Atlantic Hurricane Season:  A Joint Hurricane Testbed project to create a disturbance-following tropical cyclone genesis index (TCGI) was completed this spring and is awaiting final decision on whether or not it will be promoted to operations for the National Hurricane Center (NHC).  This project was a collaboration between NOAA/AOML/Hurricane Research Division, Florida State University, CIRA, and NOAA/NESDIS/StAR scientists.  The TCGI is running in real-time at CIRA for the 2014 Atlantic hurricane season.  Output guidance is available to researchers and NHC forecasters via the RAMMB webpage:  http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/realtime_data/nhc/tcgi/. (A. Schumacher, K. Micke)

NOAA/NESDIS/PSDI/S-NPP Tropical Cyclone Algorithm Preparing for Operational Implementation:  The NDE test system (TEST) was reinstated in June 2014 and the NPP TC Products (NTCP) delivered algorithm package (DAP) version 1.3.4 was successfully installed and run in real-time testing.  During the time TEST was being rebuilt, CIRA scientists discovered an issue with the algorithm’s use of MiRS ATMS cloud liquid water variable.  This issue, in addition to an error logging change requested by NDE technicians and bias correction added to improve algorithm estimates, is addressed in the latest version of the NTCP DAP (v1.4.0) that will delivered by 2 July 2014.  The project will have an Operational Readiness Review in July and will be briefed to the SPSRB for operational implementation in August 2014. (A. Schumacher, S. Longmore, J. Knaff, J. Dostalek)

The Advanced Technology Microwave Sounder (ATMS) – based Sounding and MPI:  The experimental version of ATMS environmental soundings and MPI estimates is now available on RAMMB/CIRA TC Real-Time web page at http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/products/tc_realtime/.   The new product, the “Advanced Technology Microwave Sounder (ATMS) – based Sounding and MPI” is using ATMS-MIRS data to calculate environmental sounding for each active TC at each synoptic time. The ATMS-MIRS temperatures and moisture profiles are used together with weekly Reynolds SSTs for this product. ATMS Maximum Potential Intensity (AMPI) estimates are obtained using Bister and Emanuel’s (1998) algorithm, using as input the temperature profile, mixing ratio profile, and sea level pressure (SLP) azimuthally averaged between 200 and 800 km from the storm center, and SST at the center of the storm. For comparison we also calculate RMPI, the SST-based MPI (DeMaria and Kaplan, 1994). In addition to the sounding shown at each plot are: SST at the storm center (SST, degC), environmental SLP (SLP, mb), AMPI (kt), RMPI (kt), environmental CAPE (CAPEenv, J/kg), CAPE at the radius of maximum winds (CAPErmw, J/kg), and saturated CAPE at the radius of maximum winds (CAPErmws, J/kg). The DDS ATMS-MIRS data feed is not yet available at CIRA, and currently the product is using developer’s data, which are usually delayed by one or 2 days, and are not necessary available every day, as well as some manually downloaded data. For these reasons the product is currently running in demo mode and is updated whenever possible, but not necessary every day. The product will be finalized when the permanent ATMS-MIRS data feed becomes available at CIRA. Currently due to the way we are getting data, the product is expected to be updated with at least a 1 or 2 days delay. Figure 1 shows an example of the new product as seen on the web page. The loop showing sounding and MPI changes during 2014 major hurricane Amanda could be also seen here: http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/products/tc_realtime/loop.asp?product=snppasnd&storm_identifier=EP012014&starting_image=2014EP01_SNPPASND_201405230000.
(G. Chirokova, R. DeMaria, K. Micke)

Figure 1.  MIRS-ATMS real-time tropical cyclones sounding and MPI product, a snapshot from RAMMB/CIRA TC Real-Time page. The snapshot shows the ATMS MPI product among other similar products available on TC Real-Time page.  The ATMS-MPI product image shows the environmental sounding and calculated values of CAPE and MPI for 2014 East Pacific Major Hurricane Amanda for 29May 2014.

VIIRS Tropical Cyclones Storm-Relative Real-Time Imagery:
The storm-relative Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS)  tropical cyclones products, developed last quarter, have been successfully running and capturing in a fully-automated procedure and displaying on the web interesting examples of DNB imagery. For example, a  very nice night-time image (12:40 AM Local Solar Time) of Tropical Cyclone Ita from VIIRS DNB (and matching IR) was captured on 10 April 2014 at 15Z.  At the time the images were created, Ita was a strong category 4 storm (135 knots according to JTWC) and was approaching Australia. This image is available online at http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/products/tc_realtime/storm.asp?storm_identifier=SH232014.
(G. Chirokova, J. Knaff, K. Micke, S. Finley, R. DeMaria)

Figure 1.  VIIRS DNB Image of TC Ita, on 10 April 2014 15Z, 12:40AM Local Solar Time. At the time of Image TC Ita was Cat 4, at 135 kt (according to JTWC).

Figure 2.  VIIRS  IR M15Image corresponding to DNB Image at Figure 1.

Cal/Val and JPSS-TC Work:  Part of CIRA’s contribution to NESDIS’ Cal/Val efforts is the comparison of MIRS/AMSU profiles to collocated dropsondes in the vicinity of tropical cyclones.  Using collocations from 3 hurricanes from 2012 (Ernesto, Isaac, and Sandy) and one tropical storm from 2013 (Karen), a low-level (below 850 hPa) dry bias and a mid-level (700-600 hPa) moist bias of the MIRS/AMSU soundings with respect to the dropsondes was found (Figure 1).  As part of CIRA’s JPSS-TC work, Convective Available Potential Energy (CAPE) was calculated using azimuthally-averaged ATMS profiles in the vicinity of tropical storms. The obtained CAPE values are suspiciously low.  We are investigating the possibility that the low CAPE values are due to similar biases in the MIRS/ATMS retrievals. (J. Dostalek)

Figure 1. Statistics of AMSU/MIRS profiles collocated with dropsondes, where a collocation is determined if the satellite retrieval is within 1 hour and 50 km of the dropsonde.  The number of collocations for each pressure level is given by the numbers on the right-hand side.  The bias is dashed and the root mean square error is solid.  The collocations occurred for hurricanes Ernesto, Isaac, and Sandy of the 2012 Atlantic season, and Tropical Storm Karen of the 2013 Atlantic season.

Plotting POES Data on Geostationary Images:  Programs written at CIRA, in conjunction with intrinsic McIDAS routines, allow for the plotting of polar-orbiting data directly onto geostationary images.  The figure below shows NOAA-18 MIRS total precipitable water associated with Typhoon Tapah at 0630 UTC 29 April 2014 plotted over an MTSAT infrared image.  Such plots will be used in RAMMB’s Cal/Val and PSDI activities.  (J. Dostalek)

Figure: Total precipitable water (mm) as measured by MIRS retrievals from NOAA-18 over Typhoon Tapah at 0630 UTC 29 April 2014.  The background is a longwave infrared image from MTSAT.  At this time Tapah’s intensity was 65 kt.

Tropical Cyclone Size Estimation:  Using the blended total precipitable water product developed at CIRA, a new method of measuring tropical cyclone size is being investigated.  This method uses the radius of the outermost closed contour of total precipitable water to assign a size to tropical cyclones.  Figure 1 shows the probability distribution function of tropical cyclone size for the Atlantic and East Pacific basins for the years 1995 to 2011.  The mean radius of the Atlantic systems is 356 km.  For East Pacific systems the mean radius is 330 km.  A Student’s t-test shows that the difference in the mean radius is significant at the 99% level, a result which is consistent with observations that tropical cyclones in the East Pacific tend to be smaller than tropical cyclones in the Atlantic.  (J. Dostalek)

Figure 1:  Probability distribution function of radius for tropical cyclones from 1995-2011 in the Atlantic (blue) and in the East Pacific (red) using the outermost closed contour of total precipitable water.

MEANWIND Program created at CIRA:  A McIDAS program created at CIRA called MEANWIND, which computes the average vertical wind profile, vertical shear values, and pressure-weighted mean wind using gridded model data, was updated to account for changes in the GFS fields being ingested at CIRA.  Although it works at all latitudes, the program was originally designed for use in analyzing the winds in the vicinity of tropical cyclones. (J. Dostalek)

Improving NHC’s operational Rapid Intensity Index (RII): In 2012 an improved method for estimating the probability of rapid intensification of tropical cyclones (RII) that resulted from a JHT funded project was accepted for operational implementation. Improvements are shown in the figure below.  However, various changes in computing infrastructure, NHC staff, and data availability have continued to delay its operational implementation.  In 2013 the method was run in real-time at CIRA and the output was provided to NHC via web pages – a less than optimal product delivery.  In 2014, CIRA has provided the data (NESDIS TPW fields, and storm-direction relative infrared principle components) necessary to run the improved RII algorithm within the NCEP/NHC computing environment. Data delivery is accomplished via the Local Data Manager (LDM).  This capability will allow NHC forecasters to access the improved forecast in the intended operational manner.  This stop-gap procedure will continue throughout 2014, but it is expected that NHC will begin producing the data supplied from CIRA by the 2015 Hurricane season. (J. Knaff, D. Molenar, N. Tourville)

Figure: Cross-validated skills associated with the RII and the new experimental version of the RI (left) and skill improvements gained by the new experimental version (right). Results are shown for the Atlantic (blue) and East Pacific (red).  The new experimental version will be available to NHC forecasters in 2014 as part of the SHIPS forecast that are produced at NCEP using data sent from CIRA to NHC.

IR tropical cyclone image archive updated:  Images from 2013 and 1993 in the East Pacific and North Atlantic were added to the CIRA/RAMMB IR tropical cyclone image archive, 16162 and 7172 images respectively.  An image showing the eight major hurricanes that occurred in the East Pacific in 1993 is shown below.  The rest of the global basin’s images for 2013 are awaiting finalized best tracks from JTWC and CPHC.  Once we have this information we will update the archive base. (J. Knaff, M. Troutman)

Figure: Eight major hurricanes occurred in the eastern North Pacific during 1993.  The panels (top, left-to-right, to bottom) show Hurricanes Dora, Eugene, Fernanda, Greg, Hilary, Jova, Kenneth and Lidia near their times of maximum intensity.  Each case is now included in the CIRA/RAMMB Tropical Cyclone IR image archive.

Improving tropical cyclone surface wind estimates:    A new and improved method to estimate the tropical cyclone near-surface winds using globally and routinely available tropical cyclone (TC) information and infrared (IR) satellite imagery has been developed.  Product development makes use of aircraft reconnaissance (1995-2012) that has been analyzed to a 1 km by 10o polar grid that extends outward 165 km from the TC center.  These analyses are then rotated to a direction-relative framework, normalized by dividing the wind field divided by the observed maximum and decomposed into azimuthal wavenumbers in terms of amplitudes and phases.  Using a single field principle component method the amplitudes and phases of the wind field are then statistically related to principle components of motion-relative IR images and factors related to the climatological radius of maximum winds.  The resulting wind field reconstruction, mean absolute errors (MAE) shown in the figure below, significantly improves on methods currently used for NESDIS multi-platform tropical cyclone surface wind analysis (MTCSWA). The work was submitted to the Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology.    (J. Knaff, D. Molenar, S. Longmore, R. DeMaria)

Figure:  Dependent mean wind field (contours) and absolute errors (MAE, shaded) stratified by flight-level analysis winds with cases with winds greater than 95 kt (left), winds 64 to 95 kt (middle) and winds 34 to 64 kt (right).  Note the largest errors are inside the radius of maximum wind where the gradients in wind speed are the largest.  The scale is the same for all figure panels.

Objective tropical cyclone wind radii from IR-based size metric:  A method has been developed to estimated tropical cyclone (TC) significant wind radii (i.e., winds exceeding 34, 50, and 64 kt) from the storm translation vector, the maximum sustained winds, and the IR-based TC size metric.  An example of the output of this method is shown in the figure below for Hurricane Ivan. The method verifies well with observations with errors that are similar to the best objective methods.  This is a significant step toward statistical TC wind radii prediction since historical records of the IR TC size metric (see Knaff et al. 2014, J. Climate) exist for the last 20+ years; providing a consistent measure of TC size. Work has begun on the next phase of this project with the ultimate goal of statistical wind radii guidance within the SHIPS model framework. (J. Knaff)

Figure:  IR and enhanced IR image of Hurricane Ivan 5 September 2004 at 2345 UTC showing objectively estimated wind radii.  34-kt wind radii are show in cyan, 50-kt wind radii are shown in yellow and 64-kt wind radii are shown in red (left), white (right).  Ivan had a maximum sustained wind of 115 kt and its motion was 315 at 5 kt.

Tropical cyclone eye detection in IR images:  Using existing historical operational tropical cyclone intensity fixes (i.e., Dvorak) a method has been developed to objectively indicate whether or not an eye exists in the geostationary image from the information contained in the fix.   To examine how well this method works, we examined the time periods of first eye identification to test the veracity of the method.  Findings suggest that a combination of this method and a rather low intensity threshold (~55- 60 kt) may provide a relatively easy method to identify periods when eye features exist in IR and visible imagery.  A few examples of first eye cases from the Atlantic, East Pacific, West Pacific and Southern Hemisphere are shown below.  In the next quarter this data set will be utilized for a number of tropical cyclone projects. (J. Knaff, R. DeMaria)

Figure:  Objectively identified first tropical cyclone eye images from 2012.  Shown are Tropical Storm Chris, Hurricane Bud, Tropical Cyclone Benlidle, and Typhoon Vicente in the North Atlantic, East Pacific, South Indian, and western North Pacific basins, respectively. Intensity information is provided for each panel.   

“NOAA Environmental Data Management Activities” Seminar, by Jeff de La Beaujardiere”: Scott Longmore and Debra Molenar attended this seminar at David Skaggs Research Center, Boulder, Colorado (S. Longmore, D. Molenar)

Big Splash at the AMS Conference on Hurricanes and Tropical Meteorology: J. Knaff, K. Musgrave, G. Chirokova, A. Schumacher and J. Dostalek traveled to San Diego 31 March–4 April 2014 to participate in the 31st AMS Conference on Hurricanes and Tropical Meteorology.   Each participant gave an oral presentation and two were also presenting posters.   RAMMB and CIRA folks were authors and co-authors on twelve presentations.  In addition, J. Knaff, K. Musgrave and A. Schumacher were session chairs.   However and possibly even more impressive is the pervasive use of data sets developed and maintained at CIRA for doing tropical cyclone diagnostics, forecasting and research, including SHIPS/LGEM developmental data, the extended best track data, the Multi-platform surface wind analyses, and the TC formation database.  A conservative count (by J. Knaff) found that at least 25 different presenters used CIRA data sets as important input to the research they presented at this conference.  (J. Knaff, G. Chirokova, J. Dostalek, K. Musgrave, A. Schumacher)

NCAR Visit:  K. Musgrave traveled to Boulder, CO to visit the Developmental Testbed Center at the National Center for Atmospheric Research.  The meeting discussed the necessary steps to port the tropical cyclone large-scale model diagnostics to community code.  (K. Musgrave)

WMO invite to lead a Special Focus session on “Objective Structure Analysis” at the upcoming WMO International Workshop on Tropical Cyclones (IWTC-VIII) will be held at Jeju Island, Republic of Korea from 2-10 December 2014.  A team has been organized and a report will be written next quarter.  (J. Knaff)

Potential funding opportunity to work with NRLMRY:  RAMMB members met with S. Swadley (NRLMRY) to discuss a collaboration opportunity with NRLMRY.  NRLMRY under US Air Force funding is developing an SSMI/S surface wind product as WindSat Risk Reduction.  The current product, however, does not produce wind vectors in the vicinity of tropical cyclones.  CIRA/RAMMB can help by using existing code to estimate the 2-D winds using SSMI/S sounder retrievals (MIRS) and solving the non-linear balance.  (J. Knaff)

Invited to be a co-author: J. Knaff was invited by K. Balaguru, S. Taraphdar, and L. Ruby Leung (Marine Sciences Division, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory) and G. Foltz (AOML) to be a co-author on a paper discussing tropical cyclones that interact with the cold ocean wakes generated by previously, but recently, occurring tropical cyclones.  He had reviewed a previous manuscript discussing the topic that was submitted to another journal which decided the paper was not acceptable.  During the review he suggested that investigating the western North Pacific basin may provide more conclusive results.    The authors followed this suggestion, and their results were significantly improved.  The paper has been submitted for publication. (J. Knaff)

Peer Reviews were provided for Journal of Climate, Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology, Monthly Weather Review and the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society.  (J. Knaff)

ORI Product Validation: The Orographic Rain Index (ORI) product is being validated with the objective of including this information in a paper for publication as well as a conference presentation in the summer.  Data was collected for several cases across more than 40 sites in California for total of 170 times series’ (5362 observations of ORI vs precip).  The Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient (R) was calculated for each time series to assess how well the ORI data (average value within 15 km of the precipitation site) correlates with precipitation.  A histogram of each time series binned by R values (Figure 1) shows the majority of events have a R value greater than 0.5, and the average R value for all events is 0.58.  This supports the hypothesis that utilizing ORI for atmospheric river events in California does demonstrate utility in forecasting orographic enhancement of precipitation.  (D. Bikos)

Figure 1. Histogram of R values for each time series of ORI vs precipitation.

GOES Sounder Split-window Difference Blowing Dust Product:  With loss of the longwave split-window temperature difference on current GOES Imagers, the only remaining source of this temperature difference is the GOES Sounder.  Although at lower (10 km) spatial resolution, the Sounder longwave split-window difference can be used for blowing dust detection.  The attached image is an example of this Sounder product showing blowing dust in the Texas panhandle.  Although not a new product, both the GOES-West and GOES-East versions are once again available online at the GOES-R Proving Ground Real-time Products site http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/ramsdis/online/goes-r_proving_ground.asp#GOES-Based_Hazard_Products.  This Sounder product replaces the Imager split window temperature difference product that have been out of service with the decommissioning of GOES-11 in 2011.  The large number of blowing dust cases in 2014 is the reason for restoring this product among the other GOES-based Hazards Products that are generated and displayed in real time.  (D. Hillger)

Figure: GOES-East Sounder longwave split-window temperature difference showing blowing dust in two parts of the Texas panhandle on 3 April 2014 at 1846 UTC.  Yellows represent -0.5 to -1°C differences, and the orange and red are larger negative temperature differences of -2 and -3°C, indicating more attenuation between the two infrared bands due to dust lofted into the atmosphere. Surface winds are also plotted on this product to accompany the blowing dust image.

Vertical cross section to supplement synthetic imagery:  Vertical cross sections constructed from the 4-km NSSL-WRF are now available for viewing on the GOES-R Proving Ground page of RAMSDIS online.  The cross sections currently contain potential temperature and vertical velocity, and coincide to the model output times of the synthetic imagery already being produced so a direct comparison between the two products can be made.  Figure 1 shows an example cross section from the 00 UTC 17 April 2014 model output valid at 09 UTC.    The location of the cross section is given in the lower-left hand corner, and the northern end of the cross section is on the left.  The jet stream near the middle of the cross section is identified by the diverging of the potential temperature contours and the upward/downward vertical velocity couplet.  The surface elevation is given by the thick line.  (J. Dostalek)

Figure 1.  Vertical cross section valid at 09 UTC from the 00 UTC 17 April 2014 run of the 4km NSSL WRF.  The location of the cross section is given at the lower left.  Black contours are potential temperature (K) and blue contours are vertical velocity (m s-1, upward motion in solid, downward dashed).  The surface elevation is given by the thick black line.

VIIRS Arctic Blog Entry on “Glow-in-the-dark Water”: VIIRS Day/Night Band imagery occasionally shows what appears to be “glow-in-the-dark water”: bright areas over water surfaces at night. An example is shown in the figure below. A new blog post discusses this phenomenon and demonstrates the cause to be moonglint: the reflection of the lunar disk on the surface of the water.  The purpose of the VIIRS Arctic Blog is to demonstrate and promote the uses of VIIRS imagery in high-latitude regions and to familiarize users with VIIRS observations. Special focus is given to the Day/Night Band, which is capable of observing phenomena and features that few operational users have seen in satellite imagery prior to the launch of the Suomi-NPP satellite. Additional images and discussion of moonglint are available on the blog website at http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/projects/alaska/blog/?p=131 (C. Seaman, S. Miller)

Figure: VIIRS Day/Night Band image of Alaska, taken 11:37 UTC 9 February 2014. The bright areas along the west coast of Alaska are caused by moonglint.

VIIRS Captures Gravity Waves in the Mesosphere: VIIRS Day/Night Band imagery is sensitive to airglow – the emission of photons in the upper atmosphere due to the interaction of molecules and ultraviolet radiation. At night with no moonlight, airglow allows for the detection of clouds with the Day/Night Band. Strong convection in the troposphere may produce upward propagating gravity waves that reach the mesosphere and produce ripples in the airglow layer. A prominent example of this is shown in the figure below. Airglow waves may also be produced by flow over mountains or by mesospheric bores. These waves are thought to be important for energy transfer in the upper atmosphere. Additional discussion may be found at the JPSS Imagery Team Blog at: http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/projects/npp/blog/index.php/uncategorized/severe-weather-in-the-mesosphere  (C. Seaman)

Figure: VIIRS Day/Night Band image showing mesospheric gravity waves forced by strong convection in the troposphere. Image taken at 08:13 UTC 4 April 2014.

Manuscript Accepted for Publication: L. Grasso’s manuscript entitled, “Evaluation of and Suggested Improvements to the WSM6 Microphysics in WRF-ARW Using Synthetic and Observed GOES-13 Imagery” has been accepted for publication in Monthly Weather Review.  Figure 1 below indicates the main result of the study: Our goal was to demonstrate that when a particular microphysical process is reduced 50%, upper level ice clouds increase towards realistic coverage. Figure 1a shows a synthetic GOES-13 image at 10.7 µm from a “control” simulation of the 4 km NSSL WRF-ARW. Figure 1b shows results from a re-run of the “control” simulation with a 50% reduction in a microphysical process. Note the enhanced cold cloud coverage in Figure 1b. This work is in collaboration with the following external scientist: Kyo-Sun Lim (PPNL), Adam Clark (NSSL), and Scott Dembek (CIMMS) and the following internal scientists: Dan Lindsey (NESDIS), and Dan Bikos (CIRA). 

Figure 1: Synthetic GOES-13 10.7 µm images from the real-time 4 km NSSL WRF-ARW. Results from a “control” run are displayed in (A). At issue is the consistent lack of upper level ice clouds. A new simulation was run with a 50 % reduction in a microphysical process; results are displayed in (B). Note the increase in cold cloud coverage.

GOES-14 1-minute Data: GOES-14 was activated on 6 May 2014, and began collecting 1-minute data on the Super Rapid Scan Operations for Research (SRSOR) schedule on 8 May 2014.  The primary purpose for this test is to gather examples of severe convection with 1-minute time steps in preparation for GOES-R.  One of the available scan modes for GOES-R’s Advanced Baseline Imager is called flex mode – this allows for the collection of 1-minute imagery over up to two mesoscale sectors. 
The NWS is unable to view GOES-14 data in operations, so CIRA/RAMMB is collecting the data via its ground station, converting it to AWIPS-2 and NAWIPS formats, and sending it to the Storm Prediction Center (SPC) and other forecast offices for use in operations.  The SPC is making use of this unique data feed, as shown in this sample from a Mesoscale Discussion issued on 5/21: “GOES 14 ONE-MINUTE IMAGERY SHOWS CONTINUED UPDRAFT GENERATION WITHIN A MORE MATURE CLUSTER JUST E OF AMA…AND ADDITIONAL TSTM DEVELOPMENT W OF MAF…SUGGESTIVE OF A CONTINUED SVR HAIL/WIND THREAT FOR AT LEAST THE NEXT 1-2 HRS.” Certain NWS offices are also providing written feedback on the utility of the 1-minute data; this will help in planning for the scan modes of GOES-R.  Real-time imagery is also available on CIRA’s website, and is being evaluated as part of NOAA’s Hazardous Weather Testbed in Norman, OK.  Many satellite animations have been collected, such as this one showing an isolated supercell moving through Denver on 20 May 2014: http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/templates/loop_directory.asp?data_folder=dev/lindsey/loops/20may14_vis&image_width=1020&image_height=720&number_of_images_to_display=300&loop_speed_ms=80The GOES-14 1-minute test concludes the weekend of 23-24 May 2014, but another is planned for late August 2014.  (D. Lindsey, D. Molenar, K. Micke)

Figure.  Screen capture from the AWIPS-2 at the Hazardous Weather Testbed in Norman showing a sample GOES-14 visible image.  Real-time one-minute imagery was provided from 8-22 May 2014.  Courtesy of Darrel Kingfield.

Geocolor Product to the Aviation Weather Center:  The geocolor product, developed by S. Miller, is now being generated on the CONUS scale at 1-km and is being sent to the Aviation Weather Center for evaluation as part of the GOES-R Proving Ground.  This product displays standard GOES data in a new way that includes customized day/night backgrounds and makes a seamless transition from daytime (visible) to nighttime (infrared) imagery.  An example of the product as viewed from AWC’s NAWIPS system is below.  (S. Miller, D. Molenar, D. Lindsey)

Figure.  Example of the geocolor product from 5/15/2014 as viewed in the NAWIPS system at the Aviation Weather Center.  

MODIS Dust Product: The MODIS dust product installation test was modified and completed, along with the installation instructions.  Once completed, the instructions out were sent out to Todd Lindley of Amarillo TX WFO (AMA) (H. Gosden, S. Miller, E. Szoke)

Presentation to the NWS:  D. Lindsey gave an invited remote presentation to the Glasgow, Montana NWS office on GOES-R synthetic imagery.  This came about as a result of one of D. Lindsey’s talks at the AMS Meeting in Atlanta in February, where one of the attendees was from the Glasgow office.  Following the presentation, instructions were requested and provided to begin displaying CIRA’s synthetic imagery products in their AWIPS.  (D. Lindsey, D. Bikos, L. Grasso)

CIRA Outreach: Scott Longmore was invited to give a presentation “Storm Chasing: The Science and Forecasting of Severe Storms” for the weekly seminars sponsored and located at Momo Lolo Coffee House (owner Colin Gerety) near the CSU main campus. (S. Longmore)

Training metrics for the quarter:

•  Teletraining:

10 VISIT teletraining sessions have been delivered.  There were 10 teletraining signups, 28 students participated.

• Learning Management System (LMS) audio / video playback modules:         
  

Registrations:  146
Completions:    72

LMS totals from January 2005 through 25 June 2014:

Registrations:  7314
Completions:  4671

Definitions used in LMS metrics:

Registrations:  The number of students who either clicked on the course, or actually took the course, but did not complete the quiz or achieve a passing grade upon taking the quiz.  A student may have registered for multiple courses.
Completions:  The number of students that achieved a passing grade on a quiz for a course.  A student may have completed multiple courses this way.

New training forum:

• VISIT Satellite Chat – Virtual interactive training sessions that are intended to:

a) be brief, target length of 30 minutes.
b) demonstrate satellite products that can be applied to operational forecasting.
c) exchange ideas across both operational and academic sides.
d) identify new training topics based on specific participant needs.
e) incorporate seasonal examples that are timely, and use real-time data (where applicable).

Chat sessions during this quarter included SRSO-R applications of 1-minute imagery and various GOES-R products related to severe thunderstorms.  Brad Pierce (CIMSS) also was a guest lecturer who presented on air quality products. 

As of 30 June 2014, there have been 41 VISIT Satellite Chat sessions for a total of 80 NWS forecast office signups. 

Recorded versions of past satellite chat sessions are available here:
http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/training/visit/satellite_chat/

Ongoing development of new VISIT training sessions:

• Utilizing Synthetic Imagery from the NSSL 4-km WRF-ARW model in temperature forecasting related to sky cover.

VISIT web-page traffic:

• The following is a summary of VISIT web-page traffic for the quarter (from Google Analytics), there were 5,011 page visits for the quarter:

Collaboration:

D. Bikos will be collaborating with many different training offices (including COMET) and local, regional and national operational offices of the National Weather Service.  

VISIT Meteorological Interpretation Blog – (http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/training/visit/blog/) – Continue to build and administer the VISIT Blog – a web-log program intended to initiate increased communication between the operational, academic, and training communities.  The blog averages about 400 pageviews per month.

Multiple blog entries were made this quarter to the VISIT and CIRA GOES-R Proving Ground blogs related to the GOES-14 SRSOR 1-minute imagery for severe thunderstorm events in May.  There was considerable interest in the blogs and these can be used in the future for more formal training on GOES-R 1-minute imagery.

The following table shows a breakdown of the metrics for each VISIT teletraining session valid April 1999 – 25 June 2014.  The participant count is collected after each teletraining session, the student is mailed a certificate of completion if they reply to an evaluation email with names.  For a complete list and description of each VISIT session see this web-page.

Meetings and Calls

VISIT/SHyMet had conference calls on 1 April, 2 May, and 30 June 2014.

E. Szoke, D. Bikos and B. Connell attended the GOES-R Proving Ground conference calls.
B. Connell and E. Szoke attended the 2014 Satellite Proving Ground/User-Readiness meeting in Kansas City, MO during the first week in June.  It was a very informative meeting with input/feedback from the Satellite Liaisons, NWS Science and Operations Officers, NWS Satellite Services Division chiefs, GOES-R and JPSS Program Scientists and many others on training and outreach efforts to date via the Proving Ground.  A big focus of the meeting was discussion of training that will be needed to prepare forecasters for the GOES-R era.  There was an increased sense of urgency in the overall discussion with the launch of GOES-R getting closer (late 2015).  Two days of the meeting were devoted to presentations and discussions by selected National Weather Service (NWS) forecasters and the various Satellite Liaisons highlighting some of the Proving Ground products being tested, and this was a very informative part of the meeting.  There will be increasing focus on training aspects as we approach the launch of GOES-R and CIRA will continue to play a large part in both training and product development.  It was a great opportunity to discuss ideas and issues with all attending: other trainers, users, and administrators.  (E. Szoke, D. Bikos and B. Connell)

1. Preparations for proposed SHyMet course:  GOES-R Instruments and Products

Highlights:
The 2014 Satellite Proving Ground/User Readiness meeting on 2-6 June at the NWS Training Center in Kansas City, MO brought together Satellite Liaisons, NWS Science and Operations Officers, NWS Satellite Services Division chiefs, GOES-R and JPSS program Scientists, data providers and other users and many of our training partners.
Presentations and follow-up discussions from the satellite liaisons and SOOs were very informative on what types of training worked best.  Overall, shorter training “bits” are desirable (20 minutes or less) as the user has limited time available for training.  It was also recognized that within a forecast office or national center, individuals hold different levels of satellite knowledge (intern, intermediate, advanced, expert) and have different ways of learning (visual, auditory, hands on).  While it was recognized that shorter training is the goal, it was also recognized that some stages of learning will require training that is longer than 20 minutes.  It will continue to be a challenge to find the right mix of materials for the varied audiences, so it is important to collaborate with our training partners so that different levels of training can be offered with minimal overlap.

One of the outcomes of the Satellite PG/User Readiness meeting was the formation of a Satellite User Readiness Training (SART) Team consisting of Science and Operations Officers (SOOs) from NCEP and from each NWS Region as well as a Development and Operations Hydrologist (DOH).  “The SART Team is charged with identifying immediate and long term training requirements that will lead to the effective and efficient use of satellite data and products in the forecast and warning process.”  They will no doubt have input on content and type of training materials to prepare for GOES-R.  We will continue on our path of gathering content and creating materials and incorporate their input as it becomes available.  This GOES-R course draws directly on expertise from the Cooperative Institutes and will strive to meet forecaster user needs.  It will be complementary to GOES-R material offered through COMET. 

Ray Hoff (University of Maryland, Baltimore County) was contacted to enquire about GOES-R Air Quality materials that can be included in this SHyMet course.  We will review 2 videos to see if they relate to the new course, and if so the need for quiz will be addressed with Ray.

The 25 minute recording of this session is now available. 
http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/training/visit/training_sessions/identifying_snow_with_daytime_rgb_satellite_products

Background information and related updates:
A preliminary organizational call was held between the SHyMet teams at CIRA and CIMSS 19 November 2012 to discuss how the course should be structured and executed, what in-house training modules were candidates for the new course, and how do we decide which external training modules to include in the course.  A second call was held on 30 November and invited Satellite Champions, COMET, SPoRT, and other researchers to provide input on training that they have that would be relevant for the new SHyMet course.  More recently, a conference call was held on 22 April 2013 to consider what training modules could be included, as well as identification of potential training material.

Course structure:  A customized / personalized training experience with training needs assessed during signup.

Course execution:  Assign the individual modules at the time of registration.  The web-pages will group the various topics but we will ask the student at the time of registration their training needs, then determine which modules to assign.
Current list of in-house modules (containing 70% or more GOES-R PG product content):

• Introduction to GOES-R (abbreviated version of GOES-R 101)
• Forecaster Training for the GOES-R Fog/low stratus (FLS) Products.
• GOES-R severe weather applications demonstrated with synthetic imagery (new module to be developed by D. Bikos based primarily on existing training content).
• Objective Satellite-Based Overshooting Top and Enhanced-V Anvil Thermal Couplet Signature Detection.
• The UW NearCasting Product.
• Convective Cloud-top Cooling and UW Convective Initiation.
• Identifying Snow with Daytime RGB Satellite Products.

External Modules:

A. COMET

• GOES-R: Benefits of Next-Generation Environmental Monitoring (multiple parts).
• GOES-R ABI: Next Generation Satellite Imaging
• Companion GOES-R module for GLM (future release).

B. SPoRT

• Lightning Mapping Array, Part 1, Total Lightning
• Lightning Mapping Array, Part 2, Applications
• Pseudo Geostationary Lightning Mapper
• RGB Products (Fuell and Folmer)

C. Potential modules from a combination of sources (Air Quality, Precipitation, Hydrology, Fire, Dust, Space Weather, Liaisons)

• RGB air mass
• RGB dust products
• Precipitation
• Air Quality PG workshop – simulated GOES-R AQ products
• Hydrology
• QPE for GOES-R
• GOES-R PG fire weather experiment with BOU and CYS
• GOES-R QPE / Rainfall Rate
• WFABBA plans / GOES-R simulated fires
• Air Quality training from Ray Hoff (videos)
• Space Weather (Steve Hill)

Miscellaneous

• CIMSS ABI WES case content
• 4 synthetic imagery VISIT training sessions (severe weather, cyclogenesis, orographic cirrus, and low cloud/fog).

Potential reference material containing less than 70% GOES-R content:
RGB products explained, Atmospheric dust, Forecasting dust storms, Volcanic ash observation tools and dispersion models, GOES channel selection (version 2), GOES channel selection (version 2),  Satellite monitoring of atmospheric composition, and Multispectral applications: monitoring the wildland fire cycle.

We will need introductory modules to briefly give an overview of how GOES-R preparations got to where they are now. We will include why there might be more than one product, as well as what to expect before and after launch.

2. The following 4 SHyMet courses continue to be administered:

1. SHyMet Severe Thunderstorm Forecasting.  Released March 2011. Consists of 7 core courses and 4 optional courses: http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/training/shymet/severe_topics.asp

      Core courses:

• Mesoscale Analysis of Convective Weather Using RSO Imagery.
• Use of GOES RSO Imagery with other Remote Sensor Data for Diagnosing Severe Weather across the CONUS.
• GOES Imagery for Forecasting and Nowcasting Severe Weather.
• Water Vapor Imagery Analysis for Severe Weather Forecasting.
• Synthetic Imagery in Forecasting Severe Weather.
• Predicting Supercell Motion in Operations.
• Objective Satellite-Based Overshooting Top and Enhanced-V Anvil Thermal Couplet Signature Detection.

Optional courses:

• Monitoring Gulf Moisture Return.
• The UW Convective Initiation Product.
• Coastal Severe Convective Weather.
• Topographically Induced Convergence Zones and Severe Convective Weather.

2. Tropical SHyMet.  Released August 2010.
Consists of 7 courses:  http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/training/shymet/tropical_intro.asp

• Basic Satellite Interpretation in the Tropics.
• Ensemble Tropical Rainfall Potential (eTRaP)
• An Overview of Tropical Cyclone Track Guidance Models used by NHC
• An Overview of Tropical Cyclone Intensity Guidance Models used by NHC
• Satellite Applications for Tropical Cyclones : Dvorak Technique
• ASCAT Winds
• AWIPS OB9 Blended TPW Products

3. SHyMet For Forecasters Learning Plan:  Released January 2010.  It consists of 6 core courses and 3 optional courses.
http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/training/shymet/forecaster_intro.asp :

This Development Plan includes:

1. Introduction to remote sensing for hydrology (NWS FDTB)
2. Interpreting Satellite Signatures (CIMSS)
3. Satellite Applications for Tropical Cyclones: Dvorak Technique (RAMMB/CIRA)
4. Aviation Hazards (CIRA)
5. Water vapor channels (CIMSS)
6. GOES-R 101 (CIRA)

Optional modules

7. Regional Satellite Cloud Composites from GOES (CIRA)
8. Volcanic Ash Hazards (Part 1)  (CIRA)
9. Volcanic Ash Hazards (Part 2) (CIRA)

4. SHyMet Intern Learning Plan: Released April 2006
The SHyMet Intern course consists of 9 modules.
(http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/training/shymet/intern_intro.asp ). 

Metrics for the 4 SHyMet courses:

Non-NOAA:
Intern:  44 Registrations; 14 known completions

The past year has seen budget cuts and a government shutdown.  As we move into the summer months, we are starting to see a pickup in the number of registrations, particularly for the Intern course.  We look forward to feedback from the SART team to determine how we can reinvigorate the courses.
NOAA is currently in the process of selecting a vendor for a new Learning Management System (LMS).  A decision on the new vendor will be made in September 2014 with a contract to start using the new LMS in January 2015.  All records from the old LMS are to be transferred to the new LMS by June 2015.  We will be working closely with the NWS Training Division to transition to the new LMS.

3. International training that builds on efforts of the VISIT and SHyMet Programs, and enhances communication and exchange of information with international training partners:

In addition to the monthly weather briefing sessions, the WMO Virtual Laboratory Regional Focus Group of the Americas and Caribbean has also hosted special seminars. 
Recordings for the monthly sessions and the special seminars can be found online:
http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/training/rmtc/fg_recording.asp
The special seminars include:

• Dr. Jose Galvez of the NOAA’s Weather Prediction Center/International Desks introduced the Galvez-Davison Index for Convective Instability (GDI) for experimental field testing. A Spanish version was presented on Wednesday 26 March 2014, and an English version was presented on Thursday 27 March 2014.
• On 8 April 2014, Dr. Mitch Goldberg, NOAA, presented “JPSS Polar Satellite System’s operational and research applications”.
• On 9 April 2014, Liam Gumley, SSEC, presented “The Community Satellite Processing Package for real-time date received by direct broadcast from Suomi NPP, POES, Metop, and EOS.

On 27 May 2014, a bi-lingual (English and Spanish) presentation “Product Updates from the National Hurricane Center for the Coming Tropical Season” was given by Todd Kimberlain and Gladys Rubio.

4. Community Outreach:  Nothing to Report this Quarter.

Monthly International Weather Briefings
The WMO Virtual Laboratory Regional Focus Group of the Americas and Caribbean conducted 3 monthly English and Spanish weather briefings (16 April, 20 May, and 25 June 2014) through VISITview using GOES and POES satellite Imagery from CIRA (http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/training/rmtc/focusgroup.asp ).   We used GoToWebinar for voice over the Internet.  There were participants from the U.S.: CIRA, the NWS International Desk at WPC/NCEP, NWS Training Division, CIMSS at the Aviation Weather Center , UCAR/NWS International Activities Office, and UCAR/COMET as well as outside the U.S.: Barbados, Belize, Colombia, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Haiti, Honduras, Panamá, Peru, St. Kitts and Nevis, and Suriname.  The participants include researchers and students as well as forecasters and other trainers.  The 3 sessions were well attended as represented by 9, 10, and 7 countries each month reaching 16, 28, and 14 participants respectively for January, and February.  Mike Davison at NCEP International Desk led the discussions.  Typically, the sessions include a look at Water Vapor imagery for a synoptic overview of Central America and the Caribbean as well as for South America.  The IR 10.7 um imagery and Visible imagery are used to look more closely at weather features.  We look at MJO patterns and the outlook, Total Precipitable Water (TPW) patterns, Sea Surface Temperature (SST) and anomalies.  Imagery from a recent weather feature is often highlighted.  Recordings of the three sessions as well as previous sessions can be found online:  http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/training/rmtc/fg_recording.asp  (B. Connell)

During the last three months, Barbados has also been conducting monthly briefings for the Eastern Caribbean to introduce forecasters in training to the operational forecasters from the region.  CIRA has been assisting with the logistics of the sessions and providing imagery through the rammb server listed above.   (B. Connell)

Figure.  Screen grab from the 25 June 2014 Focus Group session depicting the water vapor pattern over South America for 23 June 2014.  The red lines indicate the associated trough and jet maximum while the blue circle shows the location of a thunderstorm that produced 2” hail over Buenos Aires

Special Seminars

In addition to the monthly sessions, the WMO Virtual Laboratory Regional Focus Group of the Americas and Caribbean has also hosted special seminars.  They are as follows:

Dr. Jose Galvez of the NOAA’s Weather Prediction Center/International Desks introduced the Galvez-Davison Index for Convective Instability (GDI) for experimental field testing. A Spanish version was presented on Wednesday 26 March 2014, and an English version was presented on Thursday 27 March 2014.  There were participants from the U.S.: CIRA, the International Desk at NCEP, NWS Training Division, UCAR/IA-NWS, and UCAR/COMET as well as outside the U.S.: Algeria, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Brazil, Cayman, Colombia, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Germany, Grenada, Haiti, Honduras, Jamaica, Netherland Antilles, Peru, Poland, St. Lucia, Suriname, and Trinidad and Tobago.    Both sessions were well attended as represented by the US along with 10 and 15 countries, with 29 and 40 participants respectively for the Spanish and English sessions.  (B. Connell)

On 8 April 2014, Mitch Goldberg, NOAA presented “JPSS Polar Satellite System’s operational and research applications” and on 9 April 2014, Liam Gumley, SSEC, presented “The Community Satellite Processing Package for real-time date received by direct broadcast from Suomi NPP, POES, Metop, and EOS.  There were participants from the U.S.: CIRA, SSEC/UW, ScanEx/SSEC/UW, AWC/SSEC/UW, NOAA/JPSS as well as outside the U.S.: Argentina, Brazil, Costa Rica, Germany, Great Britain, Greece, Japan, and Oman.    Both sessions were well attended as represented by the US along with 6 and 8 countries, with 40 and 36 participants respectively.  Resources for these sessions as well as information on past session in this series on direct readout capabilities for polar orbiting systems can be found online at: http://www.wmo-sat.info/vlab/satellite-direct-readout/  (B. Connell)

On 27 May 2014, a bi-lingual (English and Spanish) presentation “Product Updates from the National Hurricane Center for the Coming Tropical Season” was given by Todd Kimberlain and Gladys Rubio.  There were participants from the U.S.: CIRA, the UCAR/NWS International Activities Office, and UCAR/COMET as well as countries in Central America and the Caribbean: Antigua, Barbados, Costa Rica, Dominica, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Honduras, Panamá, St. Kitts & Nevis, and Trinidad & Tobago.  The session was well attended as represented by the US along with 11 countries and 49 participants.  The presentation highlighted improvements to products being produced and offered by the National Hurricane Center this summer.  It also gave a brief look at new projects being evaluated this summer for potential use in future years.  (B. Connell)

The recordings for the above sessions are posted online at: http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/training/rmtc/fg_recording.asp  (B. Connell)

Sharing of Imagery and Products
Imagery for Central and South America and the Caribbean can be viewed at one location through RAMSDIS Online – look for the 4-week archive feature:  (http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/ramsdis/online/rmtc.asp). 
Look for information on our activities on the VLab/ Regional Training Center web page. http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/training/rmtc/

GEONETCast Americas VLab Training Channel
B. Connell participated in 2 GEONETCast Americas (GNC-A) Coordination Group telecons on 21 May and 12 June 2014.  The discussions focused on the format of the GEOTIFF files that NOAA is proposing to offer through GNC-A.

STAR Awards for RAMMB/CIRA: RAMMB/CIRA personnel participated via teleconference in the First Annual STAR Awards Ceremony, with Steve Miller (CIRA) and Dan Lindsey (RAMMB) receiving a Best Paper award for their 2012 publication of “Suomi satellite brings to light a unique frontier of nighttime environmental sensing capabilities,” in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, by authors S.D. Miller, S. Mills, C. Elvidge, D.T. Lindsey, T. Lee, and J. Hawkins.  2012: http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2012/09/05/1207034109.full.pdf+html?with-ds=yes.  Several of the awards included un-named RAMMB/CIRA personnel in some manner, for their roles in Team efforts led by STAR.  Recipients from within STAR of NOAA Silver and Bronze Awards were also mentioned, as well as Distinguished Career Awards and Years of Service Awards.  (S. Miller, D. Lindsey, and D. Hillger)

DOC Distinguished Career Award: Don Hillger was honored with a Department of Commerce Distinguished Career Award at a ceremony on May 20 at the NOAA Auditorium in Silver Spring, MD.

Letter of recognition from the U.S. Navy: CoRP/RAMMB scientist John Knaff, Ph.D. and his colleagues were recently recognized by the U.S. Navy for their invaluable support to the Joint Typhoon Warning Center (JTWC) during the 2013 tropical cyclone season and for his commitment to developing and delivering the scientific research necessary to improve tropical cyclone analysis, modeling and forecasting. The U.S. Navy and the JTWC uses their Multiplatform Satellite Surface Wind Analysis (MSSWA) on a daily basis to help assess the low-level wind structure of tropical cyclones across the Pacific and Indian Oceans. A letter was sent to A. Powell, NESDIS/StAR from Capt. A.D. Evans, Commanding officer JTWC, expressing appreciation for the NESDIS multi-platform tropical cyclone surface wind analysis (MTCSWA) and its developer, J. Knaff.  A copy of the letter is provided below.  

Suomi NPP VIIRS Latency Statistics: One of the larger issues with the real-time use of Suomi NPP VIIRS non-direct-broadcast (non-DB) Imagery is the long latency between image times and image availability.  Efforts are being pursued to reduce the latency of non-DB global imagery.  In order to monitor any potential reductions in latency, the VIIRS Imagery collection at RAMMB/CIRA is now accompanied by statistics that measure both the delay in creation of imagery granules (time difference between image time and granule creation) as well as the delay in the acquisition of those granules (time difference between granule creation and granule acquisition).  The first latency number is usually much larger, often on the order of 6 hours, and is a function of the servers (GRAVITE/CLASS and Atmos PEATE).  The second part of the latency is much smaller, on the order of less than an hour, and is a function of the transfer of the granules from the servers to the RAMMB/CIRA rotating archive.  The total latency is often more than 7 hours for all but the M-band EDRs which already have lower latency (usually on the order of 2 hours)!  A reduction in the longer latency of the I-band EDRs and DNB/NCC imagery, to match that of the M-band EDRs, is the goal of these efforts.  (D. Hillger, S. Finley)

Using Suomi NPP VIIRS to Look for Traces of MH370: The disappearance of Malaysian flight 370 has captured a lot of attention not only in the news media but in the remote sensing community, in trying to see if any traces of the plane or its wreckage might be found.  Although the resolution of weather satellite imagery is way too coarse to see the airplane, there is still the possibility of detecting either a thermal signal in infrared imagery or a visible signal in the VIIRS day-night-band (DNB) imagery.  Thanks to imagery experts Steve Miller, William Straka, and Curtis Seaman, the VIIRS archive has been scanned for strange signals in the large coverage area that the airplane is thought to have been flying.  The only signal found was a bright streak in the Andaman Sea just to the west of Thailand on 7 March 2014 at ~1850 UTC (8 March ~2:50 AM local Malaysian time) which appears to reside above the cirrus present in the area.  Location is 7.22°N, 96.27°E, approximately 500 km from last contact at 1:30 AM local time.  It is theoretically possible for a commercial aircraft to have flown that ~500 km distance 1 h 20 min.  However, there is no correlative thermal signature (in VIIRS 3.74 μm imagery) associated with the streak.  Therefore, the feature is likely just a meteor, examples of which have been seen numerous times in DNB nighttime imagery.  (S. Miller, C. Seaman, D. Hillger)

Figure 1a: Day-Night-Band image of what is thought to be a meteor as seen by Suomi NPP VIIRS on 7 March 2014 at ~1850 UTC off the west coast of Thailand.

Figure 1b: Blowup of the likely meteor signal from Figure 1a.

VIIRS Imagery EDR User’s Guide: A draft version of the VIIRS Imagery EDR User’s Guide has been posted to the STAR-JPSS website, and is available for review and feedback. The VIIRS Imagery User’s Guide was written to provide valuable background information to users of VIIRS Imagery data. This document also fulfills a JPSS program requirement as a component of VIIRS Imagery EDRs being upgraded to “Validation Stage 3.” This User’s Guide discusses differences between SDR and EDR imagery, the relationship between the Day/Night Band and Near Constant Contrast imagery, and other information specific to acquiring, processing and displaying VIIRS imagery products. This document will become a NOAA Technical Report following a review of the document and clarification of the procedures for submission of technical reports. The draft document is available at: http://www.star.nesdis.noaa.gov/JPSS/ATBD.php (listed under User Guides). An image of the cover is shown below. (C. Seaman, D. Hillger)

Figure: Cover of the VIIRS Imagery EDR User’s Guide, which has been submitted to be a NOAA Technical Report.

JPSS Annual Meeting: D. Hillger (NOAA) and C. Seaman (CIRA) participated in the first JPSS Annual Meeting, held 12-16 May 2014 at the NCWCP in College Park MD.  Hillger gave 2 talks as co-lead of the VIIRS EDR Imagery Team: the first talk being a summary of the Imagery Team’s work to date; and the second talk was a summary of things learned at the meeting, in particular potential future interactions between the SST and Cryo Teams as users of EDR Imagery.  There was also a combined breakout session on Imagery and Clouds that was well attended by users as well as Team members, some via teleconference.  The live report on that session was given by Bill Ward from NWS Hawaii.  Other interactions during this trip included Hillger meeting with Lori Brown to help resolve issues with NOAA Technical Reports (TRs), which are currently stalled due to there being no single source for reviewing, numbering, and processing of these types of reports since the death of Susan Devine.  At least 2 of the StAR JPSS Teams (VIIRS SDR and EDR Imagery) have their product User’s Guides in NOAA TR form, but are as yet not completed.  Hillger also met with Mark Ruminski at SAB about the use of VIIRS Imagery in some of SAB’s hazards products, as well as met with Sean Helfrich of the National Ice Center about their use of EDR Imagery and how the Team might help them.  Additional meetings included regularly-scheduled weekly CoRP and JPSS meetings that were attended in person rather than on the telephone.  Seaman gave 2 talks as well, one on EDR Imagery and the other on the EDR Cloud Base Height (CBH) algorithm for the Cloud Team.  Finally, Hillger also attended the NOAA Awards ceremony on 20 May 2014, as one of 13 recipients named on a Bronze Medal presented to the leaders of the StAR JPSS EDR Teams.  (D. Hillger, C. Seaman)

Terrain-Corrected Geolocations for VIIRS DNB Now Available: Terrain corrected (TC) geolocations for the VIIRS Day-Night-Band (DNB) are now being supplied as of 22 May 2014 at ~1440 UTC.  (These TC geolocations are in addition to the ellipsoid geolocations that have always been provided for DNB.  Both TC and ellipsoid geolocations have always been available for the I-band and M-band SDRs.)  An increase in the DNB geolocation file size from IDPS was immediately noticed.  (Apparently the change for Direct Broadcast users did not take place at the same time, but will occur when the code is updated.)  Three separate analyses/presentations comparing the effect of the new terrain-corrected vs. non terrain-corrected geolocations are available at http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/projects/npp/#events.  The analyses were put together by C. Seaman, W. Straka, III, and S. Miller.  (D. Hillger)

NOAA Technical Report Restart: D. Hillger is helping Lori Brown revise the NOAA Technical Report (TR) creation process, which was left in a state of confusion after the death of Susan Devine in 2012.  Lori and Don have taken charge of revising/updating the NOAA TR process, to resolve current issues with TRs and restart the issuance of TR numbers once again.  Currently there are a few TRs that have conflicting/duplicate numbering because the process has not been overseen by one person.  The goal is to standardize the review and numbering of TRs and to then hopefully have the system taken over by someone at NESDIS with the involvement of the NOAA Libraries.  Lori has made a list of all existing TRs, and is working on resolving the conflicting numbering issues, while Don is helping revise a TR Guidance document and the necessary forms and templates needed.  The reason this is important, in that at least 2 STAR JPSS Teams have VIIRS Users Guides that would best be made into NOAA Technical Reports.  The Users Guides are part of the Suomi NPP Validation requirements, and formalizing these documents gets them permanently into the NOAA Library system.  (D. Hillger)

VIIRS Online Imagery Labeling Fixed:  After years of displaying random VIIRS imagery granules for quality checking, an error in the labeling of the images has been fixed.  Label details are provided on the granule images, indicating the center latitude and longitude, the ascending or descending node of the orbit, and now the solar zenith angle and day/night indicator.  Previously the day/night indicator was sometimes faulty because the solar zenith angle had been computed with incorrect input information, including the confusion between positive and negative longitude systems.  The day/night flag error has been tracked down and fixed.  The VIIRS online imagery is available at http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/ramsdis/online/npp_viirs.asp.  (D. Hillger)

Remote Backup NAS: procured Synology RS2414RP+ NAS device and rail kit, configured the device, and installed it at the Engineering Data Center.  This will be used for off-site storage device as an emergency contingency plan should any data at the Foothills campus become unavailable. (H. Gosden, D. Molenar, M. Hiatt)

Sounder RAMSDIS Online (ROL): The transfer of GOES sounder ROL processing from Vesta2 to Ram-dev1 was completed. (H. Gosden, D. Hillger)

GOES Low Cloud/Fog (LCFOG) RAMSDIS Online (ROL): The transfer of GOES LCFOG ROL processing from Vesta2 to Ram-dev1 was completed. (H. Gosden, D. Hillger)

Thecus to Synology Data Transfer: Transfer of data storage from Thecus device to Synology device was begun.  The 64disk01nas data transfer is nearly complete and Hfipnas1 has a little more data to be transferred.  Once the necessary data has been transferred, the Thecus NAS devices will be powered off and stored at CIRA and Synology NAS devices will be used for operations purposes. (H. Gosden, K. Musgrave, A. Schumacher)

Red Hat Enterprise Linux version 6 (RHEL 6) and NFS version 4 (NFS 4): With RHEL 6, the NFS 4 became a standard.  That combination disrupted the user ID mapping of the NFS mounted devices and affected our read/write process on NAS devices.  Specifically, the User ID mapping feature became more strictly enforced in RHEL 6.  This meant that Linux systems not on the LDAP environment with shared User/Group identification specified only with /etc/passwd file were no longer recognized by eachother.  The remedy was to specify a “Doman = “ parameter in the /etc/idmap.conf on all the RHEL 6 and NAS devices that mounted onto it, as well as any systems accessing NAS devices mounted on the RHEL 6 systems.  This disrupted the backup scheme we had in place, but with the appropriate modifications, the problem was resolved. (H. Gosden)

RAMMB/CIRA Off-Site Data Storage:  An off-site NAS device has been installed in the CSU Main Campus Engineering Computer Lab in preparation for Colorado summer fire season.  The expandable storage device will provide disaster contingency back up for critical large data sets housed at the RAMMB/CIRA CSU Foothills Campus.  (D. Molenar)

GOES-14 1-Minute Data Ingest & Dissemination:  D. Molenar implemented the 1 minute data transmission to various NWSFO/National Center operational users via LDM.
The data was sent to the RAMMB/CIRA AWIPS II workstation as well to test AWIPS II’s ability to keep up with the data quantity.

RAMMB/CIRA AWIPS II Upgrade:   D. Molenar upgraded the RAMMB/CIRA Weather Lab AWIPS II workstation has been upgraded to include faster hardware and more RAM.  The performance improvement will allow for ingest of additional products.

New NAWIPS Product to AWC:  As part of the GOES-R Proving Ground, Steve Miller’s Geocolor, Dust and Fire products have been adapted to display a full Continental U.S. view in NAWIPS format.  All products are sent in real time to the Aviation Weather Center (AWC) for evaluation.  (D. Molenar)

Improving NHC’s operational Rapid Intensity Index (RII):  RAMMB/CIRA is provided real-time data (NESDIS TPW fields, and storm-direction relative infrared principle components) necessary to run the improved RII algorithm within the NCEP/NHC computing environment to NHC via LDM.  This capability will allow NHC forecasters to access the improved forecast in the intended operational manner.  This stop-gap procedure will continue throughout 2014, but it is expected that NHC will begin producing the data supplied from CIRA by the 2015 Hurricane season.  (D. Molenar)

Publications and Presentations

To Accepted and Submitted Publications  To Presentations and Posters

Published:

• Refereed

DeMaria, M., C.R. Sampson, J.A. Knaff, K.D. Musgrave, 2014: Is Tropical Cyclone Intensity Guidance Improving? Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society. 95, 387-398. 

Hillger, D.W., C. Seaman, C. Liang, S.D. Miller, D.T. Lindsey, and T. Kopp, 2014: Suomi NPP VIIRS Imagery evaluation, J. Geophys. Res. Atmos., 119:11, 6440-6454, doi:10.1002/2013JD021170.

Jin, Y., S. Wang, J. Nachamkin, J.D. Doyle, G. Thompson, L.D. Grasso, T. Holt, J. Moskaitis, H. Jin, R.M. Hodur, Q. Zhao, M. Liu, and M. DeMaria, 2014: Evaluation of Microphysical Parameterizations for Tropical Cyclone Prediction. Monthly Weather Review., 142, 606-625

• Nonrefereed

Beven, J.L., M. J. Brennan, H. D. Cobb III, M. DeMaria, J.A. Knaff, A.B. Schumacher, C. Velden, S.A. Monette, J.P. Dunion, G.J. Jedlovec, K.K. Fuell, and M.J. Folmer, 2014: The Satellite Proving Ground at the National Hurricane Center. 31st Conference on Hurricanes and Tropical Meteorology. 30-March-4 April, San Diego, CA.

Chirokova, G., M. DeMaria, R. DeMaria, J.F. Dostalek, J.L. Beven, 2014: Improving Tropical Cyclone Track and Intensity Forecasting with JPSS imager and Sounder Data. 31st Conference on Hurricanes and Tropical Meteorology. 30-March-4 April, San Diego, CA.

DeMaria, M., A.B. Schumacher, 2014: A Quasi-Equilibrium Theory for Tropical Cyclone Potential Intensity. 31st Conference on Hurricanes and Tropical Meteorology. 30-March-4 April, San Diego, CA.

Dostalek, J.F., G. Chirokova, K.D. Musgrave, M. DeMaria, 2014: A Comparison of Two Microwave Retrieval Schemes in the Vicinity of Tropical Storms. 31st Conference on Hurricanes and Tropical Meteorology. 30-March-4 April, San Diego, CA.

Knaff, J.A., M. DeMaria, S. Longmore, R. DeMaria, 2014: Improving Tropical Cyclone Guidance Tools by Accounting for Variations in Size. 31st Conference on Hurricanes and Tropical Meteorology. 30-March-4 April, San Diego, CA.

Knaff, J.A., S. Longmore, R. DeMaria, 2014: An Improved Method to Estimate Tropical Cyclone Surface Wind Fields from Routine Satellite Reconnaissance. 31st Conference on Hurricanes and Tropical Meteorology. 30-March-4 April, San Diego, CA.

Musgrave, K.D., M. DeMaria, 2014: Further Development of a Statistical-Dynamical Ensemble for Tropical Cyclone Intensity Prediction. 31st Conference on Hurricanes and Tropical Meteorology. 30-March-4 April, San Diego, CA.

Schumacher, A.B. and M. DeMaria, 2014:  Current State of Proving Ground User Readiness at the National Hurricane Center, GOES-R / JPSS Proving Ground / User-Readiness Meeting, 2-6 June, Kansas City, KS.

Schumacher, A.B., M. DeMaria, J.A. Knaff, L. Ma, H. Syed, 2014: Updates to the NESDIS Tropical Cyclone Formation Probability Product. 31st Conference on Hurricanes and Tropical Meteorology. 30-March-4 April, San Diego, CA.

Accepted:

• Refereed 

Ali, M., N. Sharma, J.A. Knaff, 2014: A Soft-computing Cyclone Intensity Prediction Scheme for the Western North Pacific Ocean. Atmospheric Science Letters.

Cintineo, M. Pavolonis, J. Sieglaff, and D.T. Lindsey, 2014: An Empirical Model for Assessing the Severe Weather Potential of Developing Convection, Weather and Forecasting. 

Grasso, L.D., D.T. Lindsey, K. Lim, A. Clark, and D. Bikos, 2014: Evaluation of and Suggested Improvements to the WSM6 Microphysics in WRF-ARW Using Synthetic and Observed GOES-13 Imagery, Monthly Weather Review.  

Hillger, D., C. Seaman, C. Liang, S. Miller, D. Lindsey, and T. Kopp (2014): Suomi NPP VIIRS Imagery Evaluation. Journal of Geophysical Research.

Johnson, R.H, R.S. Schumacher, J.H. Ruppert, Jr., D.T. Lindsey, J. Rutherford, and L. Kriederman, 2014: Meteorology of the Waldo Canyon Fire. Monthly Weather Review.

Lang, T.J., S.A. Rutledge, B. Dolan, P. Krehbiel, W. Rison, D.T. Lindsey, 2014: Lightning in Wildfire Smoke Plumes Observed in Colorado during Summer 2012. Mon.Wea.Rev.

Lindsey, D.T., L.D. Grasso, J.F. Dostalek, J. Kerkmann, 2014: Use of the GOES-R Split Window Difference to Diagnose Deepening Low-Level Water Vapor. Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology.

Tourville, N., G. Stephens, M. DeMaria, 2014: Cloudsat and A-TRAIN Observations of Tropical Cyclones. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society.

• Nonrefereed

Submitted:

• Refereed 

Apodaca, K., M. Zupanski, M. DeMaria, J.A. Knaff, and L.D. Grasso, 2014: Lightning data assimilation into a quasi-operational numerical weather prediction model through hybrid variational-ensemble methods, Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology.

Balaguru, K., S. Taraphdar, L.R. Leung, G.R. Foltz, J.A. Knaff, 2014: Cyclone-cyclone interactions: A self-regulatory mechanism for tropical cyclone activity. Science.

Gochis, D., R. Schumacher, K. Friedrich, N. Doesken, M. Kelsch, J. 4 Sun, K. Ikeda, D.T. Lindsey, A. Wood, B. Dolan, S. Matrosov, A. Newman, K. Mahoney, S. Rutledge, R. Johnson, P. Kucera, P. Kennedy, D. Sempere-Torres, M. Steiner, R. Roberts, J. Wilson, W. Yu, V. Chandrasekar, R. Rasmussen, A. Anderson, B. Brown, 2014: The great Colorado flood of September 2013. Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc.

Grasso, L.D., D.W. Hillger, M. Sengupta, 2014:  Demonstrating the Utility of the GOES-R 2.25 µm band for Fire Retrieval. Geophysical Research Letters.

Grasso, L.D., D.T. Lindsey, C. Seaman, 2014: Satellite Observations of Plume-Like Streaks in a Cloud Field.” Journal of Atmospheric Remote Sensing.

Knaff, J.A., S.P. Longmore, R.T. DeMaria, D.A. Molenar, 2014: Improved Tropical Cyclone Near-Surface Wind Estimates Using Routine Infrared Satellite Reconnaissance. Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology.

Schmit,T.J., S.J. Goodman, D.T. Lindsey, R.M. Rabin, K.M. Bedka, M.M. Gunshor, J.L. Cintineo, C.S. Velden, A.S. Bachmeier, S.S. Lindstrom, and C.C. Schmidt, 2014: GOES-14 Super Rapid Scan Operations to Prepare for GOES-R. JARS.

Schmit, T.J., S.J. Goodman, M. Gunshor, J. Sieglaff, A. Heidinger, S. Bachmeier, S. Lindstrom, A. Terborg, J. Feltz, K. Ba, S. Sudlosky, D.T. Lindsey, R. Rabin, C. Schmidt, 2014: Rapid Refresh Information of Significant Events: Preparing Users for the Next Generation of Geostationary Operational Satellites. Bull. of the American Meteorological Society.

Van Cleave, D., J.F. Dostalek, and T. Vonder Haar, 2014: The Dynamics and Snowfall Characteristics of Three Types of Extratropical Cyclone Comma Heads Categorized by Infrared Satellite Imagery. Weather and Forecasting.

• Nonrefereed 

Brummer, R., E. Szoke, D. Bikos, D.T. Lindsey, H. Gosden, S.D. Miller, M. DeMaria, D.A. Molenar, 2014: CIRA Proving Ground Activities. EUMETSAT 2014 Meteorological Satellite Conference, 22-26 September, Geneva, Switzerland.

Brummer, R., D.T. Lindsey, L.D. Grasso, D.W. Hillger, E. Szoke, D. Bikos, 2014: Synthetic Satellite Imagery Development at CIRA. EUMETSAT 2014 Meteorological Satellite Conference, 22-26 September, Geneva, Switzerland.

Miller, S.D., W. Straka, A.S. Bachmeier, T.J. Schmit, P.T. Partain, and Y-J. Noh, 2014: Fire on High—Unique Perspectives on the Chelyabinsk Meteor from Earth-Viewing Environmental Satellites. EUMETSAT 2014 Meteorological Satellite Conference, 22-26 September, Geneva, Switzerland.

Seaman, C., D. Hillger, T. Kopp, R. Williams, S. Miller and D. Lindsey, 2014: Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) Imagery Environmental Data Record (EDR) User’s Guide. NOAA Technical Report, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Washington, DC.

Presentations:

B. Connell participated in the virtual meeting of the WMO Virtual Laboratory for Education and Satellite Meteorology (VLab) Management Group on 25 March 2014.  Topics at this meeting included plans for the bi-annual in person meeting of the group hosted by the Center of Excellence (CoE) in Russia in July 2014, discussion of a “Maturity Model” to track how CoEs and Satellite Operators are progressing on training issues, update of activities from the CoEs, and plans for a Climate Virtual Round Table event.  

J. Dostalek gave an oral presentation entitled “A Comparison of Two Microwave Retrieval Schemes in the Vicinity of Tropical Storms.”  The talk was part of CIRA’s Cal/Val efforts and discussed the quality of vertical profiles of the atmosphere as computed from AMSU measurements by a statistical technique currently being used and by NESDIS’ operational microwave retrieval algorithm MIRS (Microwave Integrated Retrieval System).  The overall initial evaluation is that the MIRS retrievals are better than the statistical retrievals.  This evaluation included direct comparison of the temperature retrievals as compared to collocated dropsondes, as well as the performance of TC intensity and structure estimations produced from the two retrieval techniques. 31st AMS Conference on Hurricanes and Tropical Meteorology, 30-March-4 April, San Diego, CA.

L. Grasso gave a 15-minute presentation at the CIRA retreat at Tamasag etitled, “OBSERVED DUST CHARACTERISTICS FROM MODIS and IDEALIZED DUST PLUMES.”

D. Lindsey gave an invited remote presentation to the Glasgow, Montana NWS office on GOES-R synthetic imagery.  This came about as a result of one of D. Lindsey’s talks at the AMS Meeting in Atlanta in February, where one of the attendees was from the Glasgow office.  Following the presentation, instructions were requested and provided to begin displaying CIRA’s synthetic imagery products in their AWIPS.  (D.T. Lindsey, L.D Grasso, and D. Bikos)

Lindsey, D.T., L.D. Grasso, K. Apodaca, 2014: Evaluation of and Suggested Improvements to the WSM6 Microphysics in WRF-ARW Using Synthetic and Observed GOES-13 Imagery. K. Apodaca gave a talk entitled “Impact of Lightning Data Assimilation on Northeast Pacific Cyclone Remnants.” 31 March- 3 April, Norman, OK.

Longmore, S., A.B. Schumacher, J.D. Dostalek, R. DeMaria, G. Chirokova, J.A. Knaff, M. DeMaria, D. Powell, A. Sigmund, W. Yu, 2014: Lessons Learned From the Deployment and Integration of a Microwave Sounder Based Tropical Cyclone Intensity and Surface Wind Estimation Algorithm into NOAA/NESDIS Satellite Production Operations. UCAR Software Engineering Assembly, 7-11 April, Boulder, CO.

Molenar, D.A., 2014: Support and Utilization of the National Weather Service Advanced Weather Interactive Processing System II (AWIPS II) in a Research Environment. University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR) Software Engineering Assembly, 7-11 April, Boulder, CO. The talk focused on how RAMMB/CIRA is addressing the challenges of supporting and developing products for the still-evolving AWIPS II system. 

Schumacher, A., serving in a relatively new role as the GOES-R satellite liaison to the National Hurricane Center (NHC), gave a talk describing the proving ground activities at the NHC at the NOAA Satellite Proving Ground/User-Readiness Meeting. 2-6 June, Kansas City, MO.

Seaman, C., S.D. Miller, D.W. Hillger, and D.T. Lindsey, 2014: Evaluation of VIIRS Imagery, 1st Annual STAR JPSS Annual Science Team Meeting, Session 5b, 12-16 May, College Park, MD.

Seaman, C., Y-J Noh, S.D. Miller, D.T. Lindsey and A. Heidinger. 2014: Evaluation of the VIIRS Cloud Base Height EDR Using CloudSat, 1st Annual STAR JPSS Annual Science Team Meeting, Session 5b, 12-16 May, College Park, MD.

Szoke, E., D.T. Lindsey, 2014: The Boulder Weather Forecast Office (WFO) held their Spring Workshops last week for their forecast staff, on 7 April then repeated it on 11 April.  E. Szoke gave a talk updating the latest GOES-R Proving Ground news and description of the CIRA Proving Ground products that will be available and might be of use in the coming months. 

NOAA Satellite Proving Ground/User-Readiness Meeting: D. Lindsey, A. Schumacher, B. Connell, and E. Szoke traveled to Kansas City, MO, to participate in the NOAA Satellite Proving Ground/User-Readiness Meeting.  This meeting was heavily attended by individuals from the National Weather Service (mostly SOOs), and multiple individual conversations with them were incredibly beneficial for future CIRA product evaluations, etc.  GOES-R and JPSS training was another significant theme of the meeting.  (D. Lindsey, A. Schumacher, B. Connell, E. Szoke)

AWIPS II RGB Display:  D. Molenar participated in the AWIPS II Experimental Products Development Team RGB working group meeting in Huntsville, AL from 29 April – 1 May 2014.  During this time, the team successfully developed python routines to create the EUMETSAT MODIS Air Mass red, green and blue image components using raw MODIS data.  Information obtained from delving into AWIPS II satellite derived parameter calculations will be utilized to implement other RGB algorithms and to assist with development of AWIPS II National Centers Perspective RGB capabilities. (D. Molenar)

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Bob Rabin (NSSL) visited CIRA 25-27 June 2014.  He is involved in a number of projects in collaboration with CIRA/RAMMB scientists, including some funded by both GIMPAP and GOES-R Risk Reduction.  (D. Lindsey, L. Grasso)

Dr. John Persing of the Naval Post Graduate School visited RAMMB on 13 June 2014 and presented a CIRA seminar entitled “Insights from the Prototype Hurricane Problem:  Asymmetries and WISHE.” (J. Knaff)

Hugh Morrison, the developer of the so-called Morrison microphysics that is in WRF-ARW, visited Louie Grasso and Yoo-Jeong Noh as part of his visit to the CSU’s Department of Atmospheric Science. (L. Grasso and Y-J.Noh)

CIRA/RAMMB Visitors:  Jeffery Puschell, Kerry Grant, and Shawn Miller, all of Raytheon, visited CIRA/RAMMB on 8 April 2014.  Discussions included a visit to the CloudSat Data Processing Center at CIRA.  Dr. Puschell also gave a seminar titled “Persistent day-night visible wavelength observations in the Arctic”, promoting an instrument concept to capture day-night imagery over the Arctic using a Highly-Eccentric Orbit (HEO) spacecraft.  The guests were also given an overview of CIRA/RAMMB activities.  (D. Hillger, S. Miller, P. Partain)

Weather researchers watch severe storms up close:  S. Longmore and D. Bikos were featured in Colorado State University’s Today@Colorado State email newsletter on 12 June 2014.  The story focused on Longmore’s passion for “photographing supercells, wall clouds, mesocyclones and, if he’s lucky, a tornado.  Some of his storm images were included. For the complete story go to http://www.today.colostate.edu/story.aspx?id=10183.  (S. Longmore, D. Bikos)

NOAA Environmental Data Management Activities Seminar: D. Molenar attended the 16 June 2014 seminar in Boulder, CO, presented by Jeff de La Beaujardiere, NOAA Data Management Architect. Topics included the status of implementation of the new NOAA Environmental Data Management Framework as directed by NOAA, OMB and OSTP mandates. The seminar provided information and contacts that will be useful for GOES-R era data set ingest at RAMMB/CIRA, and for development of future RAMMB/CIRA research datasets that will meet the mandate requirements. (D. Molenar) 

CIRA Data Management Working Group: The CIRA Data Management working group has been implemented to evaluate current data inventory and archive procedures and to determine requirements/options for next generation storage and data service. Next generation capabilities under discussion include methodology to provide a citable data service, data staging requirements to facilitate data fusion, and storage and access technologies needed for the ingest, archive and service of next generation polar and geostationary satellite data. D. Molenar will represent RAMMB in the working group. (D. Molenar) 

VIIRS Data Ingest from OSPO: S. Finley and D. Molenar are working with ESPC/NASA staff to revamp the CIRA VIIRS data ingest to utilize the new OSPO VIIRS data service (which replaces the old GRAVITE GTP). (D. Molenar, S. Finley) 

GOES-R AWIPS II National Centers Perspective RGB Working Group: D. Molenar and S. Longmore participated in the working group telecon with Michael Folmer, NWS Ocean Applications Branch, to determine goals for the late-summer GOES-R Visiting Scientist Proposal team members to visit OPC/WPC/HPC. CIRA and CIMSS team members reviewed their progress creating AWIPS II RGB display capabilities for gridded simulated ABI data and for polar satellite data. Those capabilities will be leveraged to assist with the addition of RGB capabilities in the AWIPS II National Centers display perspective. (D. Molenar, S. Longmore) 

EEO/Diversity Video:  The entire federal contingent at NESDIS/CoRP/RAMMB, D. Hillger, D. Molenar, J. Knaff, and D. Lindsey, watched a video biography of Eleanor Roosevelt, titled “A Restless Spirit.”  This event satisfies one of the required EEO/Diversity credits needed for all federal employees.  (D. Hillger, D. Molenar, J. Knaff, D. Lindsey)

AWIPS 2 Experimental Products Development Team (Group 2) Training: Scott Longmore attended this training session 1-3 April 2014 at the National Space Science and Technology Center in Huntsville, Alabama (S. Longmore)

Excess & Disposal Process training:  As the RAMMB Property Custodian, D. Molenar participated in the Excess & Disposal Process webinar held on 16 April   2014.  The webinar provided details on all steps required to surplus federal property, from required Sunflower database entries and approval forms to contact with approved vendors for property disposition.   (D. Molenar)