Validation of CHIRP Satellite Rainfall Estimates

There are so many satellite rainfall products from many centers. The quality and temporal/spatial resolution of these products has been improving over time. One of the factors that contributed to the improvement of satellite rainfall products has been the use of passive microwave data.  However, this use of passive microwave data may have also introduced inhomogeneities in the rainfall time series due to changes in the numbers sensors over the years. In parallel to these products, there is also a need for historical rainfall time series derived from a single sensor (i.e., infrared sensors). Such products do exist (e.g. ARC and TAMSAT), but are limited in terms geographical coverage. There is now a new product from the Climate Hazard Group at University of California, Santa Barbara. The CHIRP (Climate Hazard Group Infrared Precipitation) product goes back to 1981 and is available at pentad and dekadal time scales and spatial resolution of 0.5deg.  CHIRP has been validated over eastern Africa,. The results of this validation work will be presented.