Quantifying the Geostationary Lightning Mapper Gridded Products in the Advanced Weather Interactive Processing System

The initial launch of the Geostationary Lightning Mapper gridded products (GLM GP) into the Advanced Weather Interactive Processing System (AWIPS) in National Weather Service (NWS) forecasting offices commenced in summer 2018. The GLM GP have never been available prior to this AWIPS implementation, so it is crucial to provide forecasters with a quantitative understanding of the products. A daily statistical analysis of the GLM GP was created to give forecasters a deeper context of the data spatially and temporally. Python and bash shell scripts were composed to calculate numerous daily statistics grid cell by grid cell, minute by minute, and overall on the three GP. Maps and graphs were developed to visualize these statistics. Selected statistics were formatted into an automated, daily-updating one-page summary, reflecting the previous 24 hours of Continental United States GP data. Statistics from the daily summaries were also compiled to produce monthly summaries. The primary intent of this data is to provide forecasters with a numerical context to the values of the GLM GP that they monitor in AWIPS that is regionally-specific and shows longer-term temporal trends. The analysis also provides a means of tracking the data quality of the GLM GP over time by illustrating false events and coverage gaps. By developing an initial climatological analysis of the GLM GP, forecasters will be more familiar with the products in real-time operations, which will allow them to better use the data to issue precise, timely warnings to those in the county warning area that they serve.