1. GOES: Geostationary Orbiting Environmental Satellite Satellite (~36,000 km altitude) period ( 24 hours for each orbit) Always above same location. Must orbit at 36,000 km near the equator so it is hard to get a detailed image of Earths surface. Good for big picture and helps forecasters assess the general state of the weather.

2. POES: Polar orbiting satellites. (~840 km altitude) Period (~100 minutes for each orbit) Much more detail in images. As the earth spins satellite covers a different area each orbit. Takes about 12 hours to get a full image of Earth from space.

3. Infrared (IR) measurements work at all hours (day or night) and can give in indication of cloud top temperature. High clouds are cold and appear white on an IR image. Low clouds are warmer and appear gray.

4. GOES Visible Middle latitude cyclone (low pressure system) White: thick clouds Gray: thin clouds

5. GOES IR Middle latitude cyclone (low pressure system) White: high clouds Gray:: lower clouds

6. Color enhance IR image to capture highest clouds.

7. IR image inferring water vapor amounts.

8. Much of this detailed surface temperature data is based on IR measurements acquired by POES

9. TRMM data comes from a POES mounted instrument http://trmm.gsfc.nasa.gov/overview_dir/background.html