Experimental Light Rainfall and Snowfall Products for Cloudsat

When it launches next spring CloudSat, a component of the A-Train formation of satellites, will carry the first millimeter wavelength cloud radar in space. In addition to its stated objective of making a global survey of cloud microphysical properties, the CloudSat 94 GHz Cloud Profiling Radar (CPR) is also well-suited to the problem of determining the distribution of light rain and snow that can be difficult to detect using current space-borne instrumentation. This presentation will provide an overview of the CloudSat mission and describe two experimental precipitation algorithms being developed for retrieving light liquid rainfall and snow from CPR reflectivity observations. These algorithms have been applied to cloud radar data from the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer (AMSR) validation experiment that took place in Wakasa Bay, Japan in 2003. While preliminary in nature, examples from this dataset illustrate the potential of CloudSat observations for studying the global distribution of drizzle, light rainfall, and snow. Ultimately, it is anticipated that CloudSat’s experimental rainfall products may shed light on the importance of light rainfall and snow observations for establishing closure in the global energy budget and water cycle.