DeMaria, Knaff, Phillips, Dostalek, Hilgendorf, Motta, Weaver
A set of web pages is under development that present experimental products based on information collected from the Advanced Microwave Sounder Unit (AMSU) on the NOAA-15 Polar Orbiting Satellite. Because of the AMSU's limited horizontal resolution (about 50 km near nadir, and about 100 km on the limb), the inner core of intense tropical cyclones cannot be fully resolved, however, the data may still provide horizontal and vertical structure information that is not usually available by any other means. It is intended that these products will be available on the web for several storms at any given time. The address of this site is http://www.cira.colostate.edu/ramm/tropic/amsustrm.stm
A loop of satellite images and overlaid severe weather observations for the Birmingham tornado event of 1998 will be placed on the web.
A Web page has been created to show the effect of bit depth (10-bit vs. 8-bit) on GOES imagery. The effects of reduced-bit (from 10-bit to 8-bit) imagery on noise in GOES images for channel-2, 4, and 5 and on two examples of image products (including the fog product) derived from GOES imagery are described. Results indicate that existing noise for channel-4 and 5 images (and derived image products) is increased by about 10% (and the signal-to-noise is reduced by 10%) by the reduction from 10-bit to 8-bit precision for GOES imagery. This result has implications for product generation on AWIPS where 10-bit GOES data is reduced to 8-bits, resulting in a loss of precision for all products. The address is: http://www.cira.colostate.edu/RAMM/cal_val/noisebit.htm
A web site describing a CD-ROM archive of the rapid scan and super rapid scan cases from the 1998 hurricane season can be found at: http://www.cira.colostate.edu/ramm/troparch.htm
An overview of the Fort Collins flash flood of 28 July 1997 by J. Weaver can be found on the CIRA home page by going to the web site http://www.cira.colostate.edu, then choosing "Flash Flood Lab" from the categories on the left.