Recent Development of GOES-16 ABI All-Sky Radiances Data Assimilation for HAFS: System Description and Impact on Different Phases of Hurricane Laura (2020)

The all-sky radiance observations from the Advanced Baseline Imager (ABI) aboard the GOES-16 satellite provide high-resolution sampling of hurricane cloud structures over the open ocean. This presentation first describes the recent development of GOES-16 ABI all-sky radiances data assimilation for Hurricane Analysis and Forecast System (HAFS), including hydrometeor-enabled vortex relocation (VR) and adaptive bias correction and observation error estimation. Given that cloud characteristics change during the hurricane life cycle from the genesis to the mature stage, the impact of assimilating ABI all-sky radiance observations on different phases of Hurricane Laura (2020) is explored using the continuously cycled, self-consistent HAFS dual-resolution EnVar DA system. Results show that the hydrometeor-enabled VR works reasonably. Assimilating all-sky ABI radiances before the onset of rapid intensification has positive impacts on hurricane analysis and forecasts. Using the offline adaptive bias correction and observation error estimation further improves the storm structure and intensity predictions. Efforts to explore the impact of ABI all-sky radiances assimilation at other phases will be presented at the conference.