Assessment of a new quality control technique in the retrieval of atmospheric motion vectors

Abstract

Atmospheric motion vectors (AMVs) are generally derived using three successive images of a geosynchronous satellite in most of the operational centres in world. This study presents a new quality control technique used during the retrieval of AMVs from the images of infrared and water vapour channels of the Indian geostationary satellite Kalpana-1. The new technique proposed here is based on wind retrieval using the previous eight images. The AMVs retrieved using a new algorithm and the old algorithm that uses the automatic quality control procedure of European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT), are compared with collocated radiosonde data and numerical weather prediction model analysis. The new algorithm shows an improvement over the old one at all levels both in terms of root mean square vector difference and spatial pattern. It has also produced significantly larger numbers of valid retrievals.