Enhanced “V” / Overshooting Top Detection
Overshooting tops on thunderstorms often indicate a high likelihood of severe weather associated with that storm. In addition to severe weather, overshooting tops are also closely related to air turbulence and are of concern to the aviation community. Infrared spectral bands are used to detect any cloud top temperature anomaly within the thunderstorm anvil. A cold anomaly is indicative of a region of higher clouds likely to be an overshooting top. Another indicator of severe weather is a strong temperature couplet associated with a thunderstorm. This couplet represents an area of very high cloud tops in the vicinity of relatively low cloud tops. Forecasters can use this algorithm to zero in on the most likely to be severe thunderstorms and issue appropriate warnings. The use of this product will benefit both the aviation community and the general public with more accurate turbulence prediction and earlier, more accurate severe thunderstorm warnings. + Product ATBD + Severe Thunderstorms Video |
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Example of the Enhanced “V”/Overshooting Top product as generated by the ABI Enhanced “V”/Overshooting Top algorithm using MODIS 10.7 um imagery on 04/07/2006 at 18:25 UTC. Overshooting Top locations are indicated by blue symbols (only OTs with thermal couplets are shown). Enhanced-V Detections are indicated by green symbols. |
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