AMSR-2 OBSERVATIONS of HURRICANE DORIAN

Operational weather analysis, forecasting, and warning utilize a wide variety of data products and tools, including satellite imagery and derived products. Satellite observations provide information where in-situ measurements are lacking or not readily available. Passive microwave satellite observations are routinely exploited by forecasters at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), National Weather Service (NWS) in the United States (U.S.) to support their weather analysis and forecasts. In this paper, we present examples of hurricane Dorian observations from Advanced Scanning Radiometer -2 (AMSR-2) on the Global Change Observation Mission (GCOM), which is part of the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA). We compare NOAA AMSR-2 ocean EDR products with storm finding documented within National Hurricane Center Dorian discussions from Aug 24th through September 9^th, 2019. NOAA AMSR-2 products are part of NWS forecasting product suite and are regularly used in daily operations. While Microwave Imagery product has been used the most for hurricane forecasting we examine usefulness of other ocean products by following Hurricane Dorian from its formation on August 24th to its demise on September 6^th.