National Lightning Detection Network (NLDN) data have been delivered to the University of Wisconsin-Madison pursuant to an agreement with Vaisala, Inc. that began in late Spring 2006. These data are ingested into AWIPS workstations running on a Dell cluster, and are available for use in tandem with other AWIPS datasets (satellite, radar, model fields, etc).

The lightning data are primarily used in case studies that are posted on the CIMSS Satellite Blog (http://cimss.ssec.wisc.edu/goes/blog). These data serve as an important piece of information that complements satellite, radar, and surface data to provide an integrated view of the structure of significant atmospheric phenomena. For example, lightning plots associated with newsworthy events (such as the lightning-caused Oil Refinery Fire in Gloucester County, New Jersey, on 11 July 2007) are overlain on color-enhanced infrared satellite imagery to relate storm structures and lightning to the fire site. In other examples, lightning data relate electrically active portions of strong convection to satellite features (such as “enhanced-V” or “warm wake” cloud-top signatures), or relate MODIS cloud phase classification to regions of lightning generation.

Entries in the CIMSS Satellite Blog act as a repository for potential training cases to be utilized in the National Weather Service VISIT and SHyMet distance learning programs. Several of the blog entries have migrated into NWS teletraining modules; for example, lightning data are used in the “TROWAL Identification” teletraining lesson to indicate the strength of a shortwave approaching a region of low-level warm air in the atmosphere.

The poster presentation will show the 6 blog entries and the teletraining example that include lightning data.