Friday, 8 August 2003
On the Characteristics of Precipitation in the Florida Keys: The Keys Area Precipitation Project (KAPP)
The Keys Area Precipitation Project (KAPP) was sponsored by the NASA Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) and ran from August 1 through October 9, 2002. The principal goal of the project was two fold: 1) to study the feasibility of using the Keys area as a ground validation site for TRMM; and 2) to complement the data set collected in the summer of 2001 during the Keys Area Microphysics Project (KAMP), which was part of the Fourth Convection and Moisture Experiment (CAMEX-IV). While CAMEX-IV/KAMP involved multiple agencies and universities and focused its efforts over the entire Florida peninsula, KAPP was designed more specifically to study the precipitation characteristics along the lower-, middle- and upper-Keys. KAPP was planned, staffed and coordinated by the NASA TRMM Satellite Validation Office (TSVO) and the NASA/Wallops Observational Sciences Branch (OSB). The TSVO provided a network of rain gauges and disdrometers and collected radar data from the National Weather Service (NWS) WSR-88D radar located on Boca Chica Key. The OSB provided 24 hour observations from the NASA Polarimetric (NPOL) radar. This presentation will illustrate the derived characteristics of precipitation over the Keys area by presenting drop size distributions, rainfall accumulations and other rainfall statistics obtained by the various platforms and will discuss the planning and implementation of the follow-on study that will be held during the summer of 2003. Also, a description of NASA?s Polarimtric Radar (NPOL) will be provided, as well as an analysis of its KAMP and KAPP observations.
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