Evaluating the Potential of CIRAS and MicroMAS-2 in Mitigating the Data Gap of CrIS and ATMS

As the Nation’s next generation polar orbiting operational environmental satellite system, the Joint Polar Satellite System (JPSS) will continue observing the atmosphere and earth surface in the afternoon orbit (1330 local overpass time) over the next two decades. These observations will provide critical support toward NOAA’s goal of the Weather-Ready Nation. Each of the four JPSS satellites will have a designed lifetime of 7 years, resulting in about 2 years of overlap between two consecutive satellites. However, the current constellation is somewhat fragile, with the possibility of a data gap in critical sounder data should the S-NPP satellite fail before JPSS-1 is launched; or in the event of a launch failure before NOAA is able to deploy a more robust afternoon polar-orbiting constellation by the 2020’s. Should one or more instruments or launch system fails, it could be detrimental to operational weather forecasts. CubeSat based infrared (IR) or microwave (MW) sounders, with the great advantage of being cost effective, could be used to mitigate the risk of the temporary data gap. For example, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s (JPL’s) Cubesat Infrared Atmospheric Sounder (CIRAS) measures hyperspectral IR radiances in the shortwave CO2 region near 5 micron. Despite of fewer channels (625 total) and reduced coverage than the Cross-track Infrared Sounder (CrIS), multiple CubeSats could be launched into one or more orbits to increases data usage, while maintaining an overall low cost. In the loss of the Advanced Technology Microwave Sounder (ATMS), the Lincoln Laboratory’s Micro-sized Microwave Atmospheric Satellite-2 (MicroMAS-2) could be used to mitigate the risk. In this study, quick regional observing system simulation experiment (OSSE) studies are conducted to 1) evaluate the impact of the CIRAS and MicroMAS-2 on local severe storm forecasts over CONUS, 2) determine whether they are capable of mitigating the risk in losing CrIS or ATMS on JPSS, and 3) determine the optimal configuration of the CubeSat orbits, such as how many orbits and how many CubeSats in each orbit. Details about the CubeSat orbit simulator, the radiance observation simulation, the nature run generation, and the results of the impact study will be presented.