Newly Released Version 7 TRMM Multi-satellite Precipitation Analysis (TMPA) Products and Data Services at NASA GES DISC

The NASA Goddard Earth Sciences Data and Information Services Center (GES DISC) is home of global precipitation product archives, in particular, the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) products. TRMM is a joint U.S.-Japan satellite mission to monitor tropical and subtropical (40 Degree S - 40 Degree N) precipitation and to estimate its associated latent heating. The TRMM satellite provides the first detailed and comprehensive dataset on the four dimensional distribution of rainfall and latent heating over vastly undersampled tropical and subtropical oceans and continents. The TRMM satellite was launched on November 27, 1997. TRMM data products are archived at and distributed by GES DISC.

The newly released Version 7 TRMM Multi-satellite Precipitation Analysis (TMPA) products consist of several important changes including 1) additional output fields including sensor-specific source and overpass times; 2) additional satellite input data; 3) uniformly reprocessed input data using current algorithms; 4) a new IR data set (Jan. 1998 – Feb 2000) was included; 5) use of a single, uniformly processed gauge analysis; and 6) use of a latitude-band calibration scheme for all satellites. More details will be presented. Several new parameters have been included, such as, gauge relative weighting in 3B43, HQ and IR precipitation in 3B42.

Data services include online tools and information web pages. The online tools are: 1) Mirador (http://mirador.gsfc.nasa.gov/), a simplified interface for searching, browsing, and ordering Earth science data at NASA Goddard Earth Sciences Data and Information Services Center (GES DISC). Mirador is designed to be fast and easy to learn; 2) Giovanni TOVAS (http://disc.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/precipitation/tovas); 3) Simple Subset Wizard for TMPA data subsetting and format conversion; 4) Data via OPeNDAP (http://disc.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/services/opendap/). The OPeNDAP provides remote access to individual variables within datasets in a form usable by many tools, such as IDV, McIDAS-V, Panoply, Ferret and GrADS; 5) The Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) Web Map Service (WMS) (http://disc.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/services/wxs_ogc.shtml); and 6) GrADS-DODS Data Server (GDS, http://disc2.nascom.nasa.gov/dods/). The Precipitation Data and Information Services Center (PDISC; URL: http://disc.gsfc.nasa.gov/precipitation) provides documentation, science focus articles and FAQ. User assistance is also available.

More details along with examples will be presented.