The launch of the NOAA-15 satellite on May 13, 1998 has begun a new era in surface and precipitation product retrievals from NOAA polar orbiting satellites. The retrieval of these products is now possible because of the improved passive microwave sensors on board: the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit (AMSU). This suite of radiometers contains 20 channels, with 5 residing at atmospheric window channels between 23 and 150 GHz. At the present time, the algorithms for the "Day-1" products (e.g., rain rate, snow cover, sea ice concentration, total precipitable water, and cloud liquid water) are undergoing validation. The validation effort is using an assortment of satellite and ground based measurements which include radiosonde, buoy, ARM surface based radiometers, TRMM satellite based and ground validation radars, NCEP model analysis, and SSM/I derived products. It is anticipated that these products will be available to the scientific community by December 1998. A description of the algorithms, products, and accuracy will be presented.
The NOAA-15 satellite also has an Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) on board, and this offers us the ability to match visible and IR measurements to those from the AMSU. This will allow for the development of much more sophisticated retrieval algorithms which can utilize information on the fractional amount of cloud cover, cloud type and height, and sea surface temperature. Hence, it is anticipated that the "Day-2" algorithms will include the use of AVHRR data. Details on these potentially new retrieval schemes and products will also be presented