Beginning in 2009,
OPC has been requested to take part in capacity building efforts internationally to instruct marine forecasters in the operational application of satellite based ocean winds from
scatterometers and wave heights from satellite altimetry. The first two courses, in December 2009 and 2011, were hosted by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) International Oceanographic Data Exchange (
IODE) facility in Oostende, Belgium and focused on training students from the Southern Hemisphere maritime nations and Europe, respectively. The most recent course, May 14-19, was hosted by Brazil's Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas Espacials (INPE)/ Centro de Previsao de Tempo Estudos Climaticos (CPTEC) in Cachoeira Paulista, Brazil. 34 marine forecasters and research meteorologists from seven South American nations participated in the week long training course. Instructors were from Europe, Brazil, and the United States.
The course consisted of the theory, capabilities, and limitations of satellite sources of ocean surface winds and waves from scatterometers and altimeters. Case studies for the waters surrounding South America were presented at various times during the week by Joe Sienkiewicz of the Ocean Prediction Center and Stephane Lirola of Meteo France to reinforce points made in the lectures and to give students the opportunity to work with the various data sets from the ASCAT and OSCAT scatterometers and Jason-1 and Jason-2 altimeters. The GEMPAK display and product generation system distributed by UCAR/Unidata was used to give forecasters the opportunity to use integrated display capabilities and to view complementary data sets with the satellite winds and waves. The course was very successful at introducing forecasters to the capabilities of satellite derived winds and waves and the power of integrated display and product generation systems in the forecast process. To help facilitate the use of satellite winds and waves in South America, Brazil's CPTEC has offered to be the data distribution point and local experts in the GEMPAK display system. Students were given DVDs with GEMPAK software and case study data to be used locally.
Joe Sienkiewicz of the OPC instructing students from Ecuador and Brazil on ASCAT capabilities.
International Ocean Vector Winds Science Team (IOVWST) - Utrecht, Netherlands June 12-14
Research and operational meteorologists and oceanographers from around the globe met in Utrecht, the Netherlands for the annual
IOVWST to share information concerning satellite derived ocean surface winds. Utrecht is the birthplace of meteorology in the Netherlands with the Royal Dutch Meteorological Institute (
KNMI) having been established there in 1854. The first Executive Director was Buys Ballot, a Dutch meteorologist, known for the Buys Ballot law, which describes the relationship of the horizontal wind direction in the atmosphere to the pressure distribution. The three day meeting was held at the Centraal Museum.
Since the loss of the
NASA QuikSCAT scatterometer, non-US sources of satellite derived ocean winds have been relied upon to fill the gap. Satellite ocean winds are used by forecasters to determine areas of hazardous winds and as the basis for marine wind warnings. Since 2006, the European
ASCAT instrument on the
METOP-A satellite has been providing partial coverage of ocean winds.
METOP-B will be launched this fall with an
ASCAT scatterometer. The Indian Space Research Organization (
ISRO) built and launched a
scatterometer on the
OceanSat-2 satellite (
OSCAT) in 2009. During the meeting there were many talks discussing the progress and improvements made in the
OSCAT data. An international team of wind experts from
ISRO,
KNMI,
NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and
NOAA NESDIS Center for Satellite Applications and Research (
STAR) have worked very hard together to evaluate the capabilities, validate the quality of the basic measurements, optimize the wind retrievals, and to share in near real time the data.
NESDIS STAR OSCAT winds can be found at:
http://manati.star.nesdis.noaa.gov/datasets/OSCATData.php/ Several talks at the meeting described the
OSCAT winds as being "near
QuikSCAT quality".
QuikSCAT is considered the gold standard of
scatterometer winds.
NOAA NESDIS processed winds from the ISRO OSCAT scatterometer showing the evening passes over the North Atlantic from 0053 - 0420 UTC 29 June 2012. Colors delineate wind speed in knots according to the color bar in the upper right.
The Chinese State Oceanographic Administration launched a
scatterometer in August 2011 on the HY-2A satellite. Dr. Xialong Dong of Chinese Academy of Sciences presented results on the progress made processing and validating winds from HY-2A. Below is an image of winds from HY-2A from 5 June 2012. At this point it is unclear as to whether near real time data from HY-2A will be made available. The validation talk can be found at:
Validation of HY-2A Scatterometer
24 hour coverage of winds from Chinese HY-2A scatterometer from 5 Jun 2012.
Joe Sienkiewicz of the
OPC gave an update as to the status of
ASCAT and
OSCAT usage in
NWS operations at the
OPC and National Hurricane Center (
NHC) (Sienkiewicz et al.,
IOVWST). Presently,
OPC and
NHC are using the 25 km winds from
ASCAT that incorporates the
NESDIS STAR high wind capability and
KNMI coastal winds. 25 km
OSCAT winds are under evaluation by
OPC and
NHC forecasters. The data is still considered experimental and will likely transition to pre-operational later this year. To benefit all
NWS offices with marine responsibility,
NCEP Central Operations Systems Integration Branch and
NASA SpORT (Short-term Prediction Research and Transition Center) are building the display capability for
OSCAT for the
AWIPS II workstations.