Assimilating Satellite-derived Soil Moisture and Ingesting Real-time Vegetation into WRF-Hydro using the NASA LIS

The National Water Model (NWM), which is an instantiation of the Weather Research and Forecasting hydrological extension package (WRF-Hydro), was implemented into operations in 2016.  Although United States Geological Survey (USGS) stream gauge measurements are currently assimilated into the NWM, satellite-derived soil moisture and real-time green vegetation fraction, both of which have been shown to influence flood potential, are not being assimilated or ingested.  The NASA Short-term Prediction Research and Transition (SPoRT) Center currently supports a near-real-time version of the NASA Land Information System (LIS) which assimilates Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) soil moisture observations and ingests Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership (S-NPP) Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) Green Vegetation Fraction (GVF), making the SPoRT LIS a practical land surface model and assimilation framework for the NWM.  NASA SPoRT recently developed an experimental version of the operational NWM in order to demonstrate the potential impact of assimilating real-time, satellite-derived soil moisture and vegetation on simulated streamflow.  This presentation will highlight several case studies that demonstrate the impact of assimilating SMAP soil moisture and ingesting real-time VIIRS vegetation into the NWM using the NASA LIS on improving situational awareness and streamflow prediction.