Presenting Author: Dr. Michael Brennan

The operational utility of satellite ocean surface vector winds from QuikSCAT and ASCAT at the National Hurricane Center (NHC) and Central Pacific Hurricane Center (CPHC) will be presented. An update on the operational use of QuikSCAT data for tropical cyclone center fixing, intensity and structural analysis will be given, as these data continue to be heavily used by NHC forecasters, particularly for tropical cyclones that are not sampled by aircraft reconnaissance. The utility of QuikSCAT data in tropical and sub-tropical marine meteorological applications will also be summarized. An initial evaluation of the operational use of ASCAT data in operational tropical cyclone and marine applications will also be presented. ASCAT’s narrower data swaths, coarser resolution (and therefore lesser sensitivity to high wind speeds), and reduced sensitivity to rain make ASCAT retrievals quite different in character from those provided by QuikSCAT. The largest limitation of ASCAT is that the instrument provides significantly fewer passes over tropical cyclones and other weather features of interest, particularly at low latitude. ASCAT processing by NOAA/NESDIS and display capabilities at NHC have continued to evolve, improving the utility of ASCAT retrievals when the data swath does capture the center of a tropical cyclone. Finally, comments on plans for the post-QuikSCAT era from the NHC/CPHC perspective will be provided.

2025 International OVWST Meeting May 5th - 8th Darmstadt, Germany

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