TRMM Ground Validation Radar Site 3D Rain Map L3 1 month 2 km V7 (TRMM_3A55) at GES DISC

The 3A55, 'Monthly 3-D Structure', provides radar site monthly 3-D structure information obtained from 2A55.
The 2A55 'Radar Site 3-D Reflectivities', is composed of 3 different fields. The first field has an array of 3-D reflectivities in Cartesian coordinates with a 2 km horizontal resolution over an area of 300 km x 300 km for single radar sites, and 724 km x 568 km for Texas multiple radar site, 512 km x 704 km for Florida multiple radar site. It has a vertical resolution of 1.5km and a height range up to 19.5 km. The second field has an array of vertical profiles based on the first field, and the third field has an array of the Contoured Frequency by Altitude Diagram (CFAD) data based on the first and second field.

A key component of the TRMM project is the Ground Validation (GV) effort which consists of collecting data from ground-based radar, rain gauges and disdrometers. The data is quality-controlled, and then validation products are produced for comparison with TRMM satellite products.

The four primary GV sites are:

• Darwin, Australia;
• Houston, Texas;
• Kwajalein, Republic of the Marshall Islands;
• Melbourne, Florida.

A significant effort is also being supported at NASA Wallops Flight Facility (WFF) and vicinity to provide high quality, long-term measurements of rain rates (via a network of rain gauges collocated with National Weather Service gauges), as well as drop size distributions (DSD) using a variety of instruments, including impact-type Joss Waldvogel, laser-optical Parsivel, as well as two-dimensional video disdrometers. DSD measurements are also being collected at Melbourne and Kwajalein using Joss-Waldvogel disdrometers.