GMAO Band09 Obs Caribbean GMAO vs. GOES

GMAO Caribbean GOES vs GMAO

NASA's Global Modeling and Assimilation Office (GMAO) maintains a collection of models and assimilated data products used in the prediction and analysis of phenomena related to Earth's atmosphere, ocean, and cyrosphere. This animation demonstrates the predictive capability of GMAO products as compared to satellite observations made by the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites (GOES) network, a NASA and NOAA joint satellite program that provides continuous imagery and data on atmospheric conditions and solar activity (space weather).

GOES Channel 9 observations (6.9 micrometer wavelength) of the Caribbean are used in this comparison, which offer an estimate of "mid-level" water vapor distribution (when the view is unobstructed by higher-level clouds). This band is useful in jet stream identification, hurricane track forecasting, mid-latitude storm forecasting, severe weather analysis, and mid-level moisture estimation.