Title

Oceanic Rain Rates From The Windsat Radiometer

Keywords

Microwave polarimetry; Rain retrieval; TMI; WindSat

Abstract

WindSat is a high precision, conical scanning microwave radiometer that was launched in January 2003 on the Coriolis satellite. The main objective of the WindSat mission is to demonstrate the "proof of concept" of measuring the ocean surface wind speed and direction using polarimetric microwave radiometry. However, in addition to wind vector, this five frequency, 22-channel radiometer is used to remotely sense other atmospheric and ocean surface environmental parameters. This paper presents the first utilization of WindSat to infer rain rates over the ocean. A description of the WindSat multi-channel, physically-based, rainfall retrieval algorithm is given. This preliminary algorithm is a modified version of the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer (AMSR-E) oceanic rainfall algorithm developed at the Colorado Sate University. Examples of WindSat retrieved rain rates are presented for a variety of oceanic rain events. Further, a quantitative assessment of the WindSat rainfall retrieval accuracy is made through comparisons with rain measurements from the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) standard products. Results from statistical comparisons are presented using collocated rain observations obtained near-simultaneously by WindSat and the TRMM Microwave Imager (TMI). © 2005 IEEE.

Publication Date

12-1-2005

Publication Title

International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium (IGARSS)

Volume

3

Number of Pages

2046-2049

Document Type

Article; Proceedings Paper

Personal Identifier

scopus

DOI Link

https://doi.org/10.1109/IGARSS.2005.1526417

Socpus ID

33745726944 (Scopus)

Source API URL

https://api.elsevier.com/content/abstract/scopus_id/33745726944

This document is currently not available here.

Share

COinS