CIRA/Colorado State University & *NOAA/NESDIS/STAR
Asia-Oceania Meteorological Satellite Users’ Conference (AOMSUC-10), Melbourne, Australia 2-6 December 2019 1 CIRA’s SLIDER Website
22 June 2017: CIRA launched SLIDER to the public
SLIDER: Satellite Loop Interactive Data Explorer in Realtime
This website was designed to loop GOES-R (16/17) and Himawari-8 images in realtime
Imagery is displayed at varying zoom levels from the full view of the full disk (16 km), down to the full resolution of the visible channels (500 m) Animated GIF http://rammb-slider.cira.colostate.edu 2 Full Resolution Imagery
The Advanced Baseline Imager (ABI) on GOES-16/17 and the Advanced Himawari Imager (AHI) on Himawari-8/9 have similar capabilities.
For these satellites, imagery is offered at 6 zoom levels ranging from 16 km (full disk view) to 0.5 km (full resolution of the 0.64 μm visible band), with full looping capability at each zoom level.
Zoom in anywhere within each satellite’s field-of-view!
Animated GIF 3 GOES-East (GOES-16)
GOES-East (default)
All 16 ABI bands
Popular RGB composites and multispectral imagery products
GOES-R AWG cloud products
GLM flash count and energy density
http://rammb-slider.cira.colostate.edu/?sat=goes-16
Animated GIF 4 Add Overlays
GeoColor with GLM Energy Density Overlay
2018-09-24 MP4 Video 5 Opacity Blending
Blending of visible and infrared imagery, often referred to as the “Sandwich Product” is available on SLIDER by taking advantage of “Add Overlay” and varying the opacity of the top layer.
This example shows the Sandwich Product for severe thunderstorms over the south- central United States (6 April 2018). Animated GIF 6 Opacity Blending
Any two products may be blended on SLIDER.
Here is an example of the Natural Color RGB blended with the Fire Temperature RGB to highlight fires in the Yukon Territory of Canada (9 September 2019).
Animated GIF 7 GOES-West (GOES-17)
GOES-West (added Nov. 2018)
Product list same as GOES-16
http://rammb-slider.cira.colostate.edu/?sat=goes-17
Animated GIF 8 GOES-West GLM
This example shows the JMA Day Cloud Phase Distinction RGB with GLM overlay showing rare thunderstorms in Hawaii.
The thin blue line that appears on the GLM images on SLIDER indicates the edge of the GLM field-of-view. The GOES-17 GLM sees New Zealand’s North Island and the northern half of the South Island. Also: New Caledonia, Vanuatu and points east are in; points west are out
Animated GIF 9 Himawari-8
Himawari-8
All 16 AHI bands
Most of the popular RGB composites and multispectral imagery products
GOES-R cloud algorithms applied to Himawari data
http://rammb-slider.cira.colostate.edu/?sat=himawari
Animated GIF 10 Rapid Scan Mesoscale Sector
SLIDER includes the Japan Sector and the rapid-scan (2.5 min) mesoscale sector from Himawari, providing amazing images like this loop of Typhoon Soulik (20 August 2018).
Animated GIF 11 Volcanic Eruptions in the Airmass RGB
The Airmass RGB captured a plume of gases from the eruption of the Ambae volcano on Vanuatu (26 July 2018).
Animated GIF 12 Fires in Eastern Australia
There are multiple ways to monitor fires on SLIDER, including the Natural Fire Color RGB (left) and Fire Temperature RGB (right).
This allows for a direct comparison of each product’s strengths and weaknesses.
This example shows the explosive growth of fires in New South Wales and Queensland on 8 November 2019.
Animated GIF 13 Meteosat-8 (IODC)
Meteosat-8 (added Nov. 2019)
11 SEVIRI bands (limited to hourly display only)
15-min. display of RGB composites allowed
Four zoom levels from 3 km (full resolution) to 24 km
Full Disk only
More imagery http://rammb-slider.cira.colostate.edu/?sat=meteosat-8 products to come, including HRV Animated GIF 14 Meteosat-11
Meteosat-11 (added Nov. 2019)
Same as Meteosat-8
http://rammb-slider.cira.colostate.edu/?sat=meteosat-11
Animated GIF 15 Introducing Polar SLIDER
Launched in October 2018, the goal of Polar SLIDER is to show the most recent VIIRS data (all 22 bands) for each location on Earth at all times - with low- enough latency to be useful for forecasters.
Looping capability is great for monitoring weather in the Arctic and Antarctic.
This is the Northern Hemisphere view of our VIIRS GeoColor product.
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16 Southern Hemisphere View
Here is the Southern Hemisphere view of Polar SLIDER.
The VIIRS Day/Night Band observed a 6-day aurora event over Antarctica (9-15 May 2019).
No geostationary satellite has an equivalent to the Day/Night Band.
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17 Twice the VIIRS
By default, Polar SLIDER shows both VIIRS (S-NPP and NOAA-20). This is like having a geostationary satellite hovering over each pole!
If you are a S-NPP snob (or NOAA-20 snob) you can choose to display only one satellite by changing the loop time step from 51 min. to 102 min.
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18 All Your Favorite Features
The “Add Overlay” feature allows you to compare two spectral bands or blend them together.
One popular use is the “Sandwich Product” which blends longwave IR Slider Bar imagery with visible imagery to provide unique detail of the cloud top Add overlay structure.
Since we have the Day/Night Band, we can extend the utility of the Sandwich Product to nighttime as well! The “Slider” bar with overlay turned on lets you easily compare two Other Features spectral bands. Other features include: “Flow- Following” for feature tracking, “Mouse Draw” for annotations, and “Share URL” for easy sharing.
19 DIY GIF
SLIDER now has do-it- yourself animations!
Download individual images, or make an animated GIF or new animated PNG format
Be careful, or it will break your browser!
20 Summary
❖ Currently, there are 5 geostationary satellites on SLIDER that provide nearly complete global coverage. ❖ Geo-KOMPSAT-2A? ❖ FY-4A? ❖ Meteosat Third Generation? ❖ The JPSS constellation of polar-orbiting satellites (S-NPP and NOAA-20) provide complete global coverage twice daily. ❖ Additional RGB composites coming soon ❖ Rotate Polar SLIDER so your region of interest is always “up” ❖ We are exploring improved Equatorial coverage on “Polar SLIDER” ❖ Possibility of additional satellites/sensors (e.g. MODIS/METImage/microwave/soundings) ❖ Improvements to map displays ❖ Political boundaries: county/state/province/district ❖ Major rivers, major highways ❖ Feedback is always welcome! Scan QR code with your phone to launch SLIDER
http://rammb-slider.cira.colostate.edu 21 System Requirements
From the lead developer Kevin Micke:
❖ Video card: the most important thing is a decent video card. It doesn't have to be high- end, but there are mediocre on-board ones that will struggle. A mid-level video card should be fine. ❖ RAM: 2 GB+ of RAM, and the more the better ❖ CPU: A mid-level CPU should be plenty, but if you've got dozens of browser tabs open, SLIDER will likely start to slow down ❖ Network: The faster the internet connection, the better. Under 5-10 Mbps a user will probably start to feel like it's seeming slow. The other important factor is network latency—the amount of time it takes data to get from your device to our server and back. The further away users are from Fort Collins (the other side of the planet, for instance), the longer the latency will be. A user's network is also a factor in latency, but there's often not much they can do about it. ❖ Browser: Chrome works best of all browsers, followed by Firefox. I'm not aware of any browsers where it's completely broken, as I've tried to make it as backwards-compatible as possible, though there might be some lesser-known ones that don't work.
22 GeoColor Differences
AHI has the red, green and blue visible bands necessary to make True Color images, HybridSynthetic True Hybrid Color which we improve upon using the 0.86 μm Meteosat-8 Enhanced Natural Color Himawari-8 Hybrid True Color “veggie” band and a correction for Rayleigh scattering (Hybrid Atmospherically 04 UTC 26 Nov 2019 Corrected True Color). This is the daytime component of AHI GeoColor.
ABI is missing the green band. CIRA has developed a method to synthesize a green band using the blue, red and “veggie” (0.86 μm) bands. ABI GeoColor is made with Synthetic Hybrid Atmospherically Corrected (SHAC) True Color.
SEVIRI only has the red and veggie bands, so True Color is not available. Instead, we use the EUMETSAT “Enhanced Natural Color” RGB as the daytime component for SEVIRI GeoColor. This leads to differences in aerosol detection as evidenced by smog over India. 23 Watch for Ice
Polar SLIDER is great for monitoring the ever-shifting ice at high latitudes.
The VIIRS Natural Color RGB is available at 375m resolution!
Example: Monitor ice breakup along the coast of Siberia over a four-day period
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24 Volcanic Eruptions
S-NPP and NOAA-20 combined to provide three views of the explosive eruption of Raikoke off the Kamchatka Peninsula in true color (21 June 2019)
25 Avenues of Exploration
?
Ice motion is apparent off the coast of Antarctica.
But, interesting features show up inland. What are they?
VIIRS Day/Night Band Animated GIF 26 Not Just Satellites
For GOES-16 and GOES-17 CONUS sectors, we now display radar data from the Multi-Radar Multi-Sensor (MRMS) product suite produced by the U.S. National Severe Storms Laboratory (NSSL).
27 JPSS Cloud and Retrieval Products Available
All 22 VIIRS bands
Both S-NPP and NOAA-20
RGBs and VIIRS GeoColor
JPSS cloud products
NUCAPS retrieval products
VIIRS Cloud Phase overlaid on top of Geocolor in SLIDER 28 NUCAPS Products on SLIDER
NUCAPS is a suite of retrieval algorithms applied to polar-orbiting microwave and IR sounding data. One popular NUCAPS product now on Polar SLIDER is Cold Air Aloft.
Cold Air Aloft is defined by air temperatures of -65° C or below. At these temperatures, aircraft fuel begins to freeze, which is a significant hazard for aviation.
When cold air aloft is present, zoom in on SLIDER to view flight levels impacted by the cold air.
Currently Northern Hemisphere only Contact me if you would like a Southern Hemisphere version on SLIDER
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