ACE-ASIA Satellite:  DMSP SSM/I Derived Products, Rainfall Imagery (GIF)


1.0  General Information


The DMSP SSM/I Rainfall Imagery (GIF) is one of several satellite products collected as 
part of the ACE-Asia project field catalog operated by the University Corporation for 
Atmospheric Research/Joint Office for Science Support (UCAR/JOSS; http://www.joss.ucar.edu
/ace-asia/catalog/). The images were produced by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration (NOAA) Environmental Technology Laboratory (ETL) from the Defense
Meteorological Satellite Program (DMSP) Special Sensor Microwave/Imager (SSM/I). 
Images are available once per day.  The products cover the period from 28 February 2001 to
4 May 2001 and cover the region from about 45S to 45N and 0 to 180E.  The products were
acquired from the NOAA/ETL (http://www.etl.noaa.gov/satres/dmsp_game.html)  All images
are in GIF format.


2.0  Data Contact

John Bates
NOAA/OAR/ETL
325 Broadway Street, Mailstop R/ET7
Boulder, CO  80305
Telephone: (303)497-6646
Email: John.J.Bates@noaa.gov


3.0  Product Information

The SSM/I data are provided courtesy of NOAA/NESDIS. SSM/I retrieved rainfall, cloud
liquid water, and integrated water  vapor products are computed daily over the region from
45S to 45N and 180E to 0W at a spatial resolution of 0.25 x 0.25 degrees. Data were 
received from three SSM/I instruments, including DMSP F11, F13, and F14.

Ferriday global rainfall algorithm

This algorithm is based on a fairly simple combination of the SSM/I channels utilizing all
four SSM/I frequences as well as dual polarization information. Different algorithms are
utilized over land and ocean with the ocean algorithm using both liquid water emission and
ice scattering information while the land algorithm uses a simple ice scattering retrieval
technique. The algorithm was developed by James Ferriday (Ferriday and Avery 1994).


4.0  Quality Control Procedures


UCAR/JOSS conducted no quality checks on these data.

5.0  File Naming Convention


The file names are structured as follows:

dmsp.yyyymmdd.SSM-I_Rainfall.gif

Where dmsp is the type of satellite used
      yyyy is the four digit year
      mm is the two digit month
      dd is the two digit day
      SSM-I_Rainfall is the name of the product


6.0  References


Ferriday, J. G. and S. K. Avery, 1994: Passive microwave remote
   sensing of rainfall with SSM/I: Algorithm development and
   implementation, J. Appl. Meteor., Vol 33, pp. 1587-1596.