Revised Virtual Institute for Satellite Integration Training (VISIT) Lesson

The Virtual Institute for Satellite Integration Training (VISIT) Lesson titled “Forecasting Convective Downburst Potential Using GOES Sounder Derived Products” has been revised by K. Pryor to include new case studies and new instructional material pertaining to the Graphyte Toolkit and the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES) channel 3 – channel 4 brightness temperature difference (BTD) product. The objective of the lesson is to provide better understanding of techniques for predicting the risk of convective downbursts utilizing Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES) sounder derived data. The guide for the lesson as well as the revised version of the lesson are available on the VISIT web site.

Figure 1. Page 29 from VISIT lesson “Forecasting Convective Downburst Potential Using GOES Sounder Derived Products” displaying the new Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES) imager channel 3 – channel 4 brightness temperature difference (BTD) microburst product.

Figure 1 shows new instructional material from the VISIT lesson “Forecasting Convective Downburst Potential Using GOES Sounder Derived Products”. This page compares a Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES) imager channel 3 – channel 4 brightness temperature difference (BTD) product to a pre-convective GOES sounding profile during the afternoon of 5 August 2010. Note that the dry-air notch in the product image on the left is pointing southeastward toward a convective storm moving through the Washington, DC area. The presence of mid-tropospheric dry air was established by the GOES sounding profile over Washington, DC about two hours prior to strong downburst occurrence. The channeling of dry air into the rear of the convective storm most likely played a significant role in generating downdraft energy. Downburst wind gusts of 42 knots were recorded by the Washington Tide Station and the Upper Potomac River (white cross) buoy during the afternoon of 5 August 2010.