Understanding and predicting water cycles and water resources are important for sustainability worldwide. GIS technology enables incorporation of multi-sensor, multi-parameter observations to provide a holistic, multi-dimensional view of atmospheric phenomena as a system. In this study GIS techniques are used to visualize and analyze a severe precipitation event and drought conditions in the United States by incorporating observations from multiple sources including remotely sensed observations, assimilated data, in-situ and model results. Data from AIRS, AMSR-E, QuikSCAT, TRMM precipitation, Level 4 SST observations, GPS measurements, back-trajectories from NOAA's HYSPLIT model, and in-situ sources are incorporated within a unified analytical GIS framework for analysis of extreme events related to the water cycle.

Keywords: Geographic Information Systems, GIS, AIRS, TRMM, QuikSCAT, Extreme precipitation, drought