News

HMT Participates in NASA GPM Workshop

January 10, 2014

HMT recently participated in the Sixth NASA GPM Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) International GV Workshop in Rome, Italy. The workshop was hosted by the National Research Council of Italy (CNR), Institute of Atmospheric Sciences and Climate (ISAC), in coordination with NASA's Precipitation Measurement Missions (PMM) Science Program with nearly 100 registered participants.

The workshop focused on several themes, including:

• Developing consensus plans for post-launch assessments of satellite algorithms/products using GV measurements;
• Reviewing results from physical validation and related field campaign measurements; and,
• Coordination of Integrated Validation activities

HMT was represented by Rob Cifelli of NOAA's Earth System Research Laboratory in Boulder, Colorado. Dr. Cifelli presented a poster describing NOAA's role in NASA GPM and a talk on HMT-SEPS. In addition to the formal presentations, the workshop provided an opportunity for HMT to coordinate QPE, QPF, and hydrology activities on upcoming NASA GV field campaigns: the Integrated Precipitation and Hydrology Experiment (IPHEX) planned for May-Jun 2014 in North Carolina and the Olympic Mountains Experiment (OLYMPEX) planned for late 2015 in Washington.

The GPM mission will begin its operational phase with the launch of the Core satellite by NASA and JAXA in early 2014. The GPM Core Observatory will carry an advanced radar-radiometer system to unify and advance precipitation observations from a constellation of research and operational satellites provided by the United States, Japan, France, India, and the European community. International science collaboration in GPM Ground Validation (GV) plays a vital role in refining remote sensing algorithms and in assessing the quality and utility of satellite precipitation products in different climate and geographic regimes. Through a series of international planning workshops held in the United Kingdom, Taiwan, Brazil, Finland, and Canada, GPM has established a framework for international GV science collaboration to support pre-launch algorithm development and post-launch GPM product evaluation.

Contact: Rob Cifelli