Wayne Faas Chief, NOAA National Climatic Data Center Data Operations Division December 3, 2003

NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center What Will be Covered Operational use of lightning data in NOAA NCDC hydrometeorological operations Potential uses of lightning data Potential lightning data uses with radar reflectivity data to improve and develop remote sensing projects Lightning data uses at the Air Force Combat Climatology

December 3, 2003 NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center Operational Use of Lightning Data in NOAA NCDC Operations Precipitation Validation (PrecipVal) An Automated, Spatial Precipitation Quality Control & Estimator System Improve data quality by providing automated spatial review of precipitation point data using other sources of data (in-situ, radar, satellite & model) Currently in prototype

December 3, 2003 NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center Operational Use: PrecipVal Components 1. Collect external data sources to be incorporated in PrecipVal 2. Create Layers (grids) for specified observation times 3. Perform rules based inter- comparison of precipitation point data to derived validation grids 4. Create confidence flags based on threshold agreement between layers

December 3, 2003 NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center Operational Use: Current Quality Control Layers In-Situ (ASOS/AWOS/CRN) Radar Model Satellite (7 Individual products) Modular System: Layers Can Be Added / Deleted

December 3, 2003 NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center Operational Use: RADAR Grids created using NOAA WSR-88D products: Digital Precip Array (DPA): NEXRAD level III product Resides in NCDC Archive Present in Alaska, Hawaii and Puerto Rico Resolution: km Stage-4 Radar: Accessed from National Center for Environmental Predication (future plans to access from NOMADS) Mosaics DPA into ConUS Grid. Resolution: km

December 3, 2003 NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center Operational Use: Model Data Grids created from NOAA model output: Current model data used Rapid Update Cycle (RUC) NCEP Product (access from NOMADS) Resolution: km

December 3, 2003 NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center Operational Use: Satellite Grids created using NOAA satellite products: 7 Satellite Products (NESDIS)  Stage-4  Operational Auto-Estimator  Hydro-Estimator without Radar Correction  Hydro-Estimator with Radar Correction  Microwave/IR blend  GMSRA with nighttime screen  Original GMSRA (GOES Multispectral Rainfall Algorithm) Resolution: km

December 3, 2003 NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center Potential Uses of Lightning Data Correlation studies Nationally, regionally Daytime, Nocturnal Events Severe Storms and Tornadoes Hurricanes Precipitation Floods Snow/Ice storms/Blizzards Extreme events Flash floods Wildfires

December 3, 2003 NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center Potential Use with Radar Reflectivity Data to Improve and Develop Remote Sensing Projects Quantitative Precipitation Estimation (QPE) algorithm development Reflectivity to rain rate transformation Identification of convective areas integrated into parameter selection Delineation of cloud areas associated with lightning Identify icing areas – Bright band Spatial extent of raining areas – QPE spatial resolution Advection effect correction Include lighting data in development of algorithms Correct for sampling problems of radar – QPE temporal resolution Data mining of QPE and lightning Find relation with convective rainfall and hail Identify hail climatology Lightning climatology Parse out regions for comparison with radar rainfall climatologies Patterns of highly convective precipitation

December 3, 2003 NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center AF Combat Climatology Center Operational Uses of Lightning Data (Restricted Redistribution of Data) Site specific lightning climatologies - frequency of lightning strikes within a certain radius of a location Post event analysis - what lightning strikes occurred within a certain radius of a location

December 3, 2003 NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center Distribution of Lightning Data Restricted redistribution to appropriate users

December 3, 2003 NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center NCDC Contacts Planning Office – John Jensen Data Operations – Wayne Faas/Stephen Del Greco Scientific Services – Dave Easterling Remote Sensing and Applications – John Bates/Brian Nelson