WHyMSIE’s overarching goal was to provide the science community with a first of a kind foundational observational testbed to:
- Socialize and compare novel technology (i.e., the Conical Scanning Millimiter-wave Radiometer – Hyperspectral, CoSMIR-H, and the Microwave BArometric Radar and Sounder, MBARS) and innovative algorithm approaches, particularly those harnessing data fusion strategies;
- Participate collaboratively in assessing gaps and uncertainties in the current program of record and identify priorities for future PBL observing strategies;
- Conceive and deliver PBL focused Science and Applications Traceability Matrices (SATMs) to help consolidate the design and scientific objectives of a PBL mission.
To that end, fulfilling WH2yMSIE’s objectives was critical to mature PBL from incubation to designated observable and top tier mission prioritization in the next Decadal (Gambacorta et al. 2024).
The WHyMSIE experiment incorporated observations from ground-, suborbital-, and space-based platforms. Beyond demonstrating the CoSMIR-H instrument, the experiment focused on a wide variety of PGLM regimes and surface types. The suborbital data came from instruments aboard the NASA ER-2. Additionally, the G-III aircraft, flying as part of NOAA’s Active and Passive Profiling Experiment (APEX) provided another suite of data for WHyMSIE. Lastly, the experiment emphasized flights that maximized satellite over passes from the NOAA 21 and NOAA 20 satellites.
Start and End Times: October 18, 2024 – November 15, 2024
Processing Level: 1A, 2
Formats: HDF5, ICARTT-ASCII, netCDF-4, PNG
Platforms: Ground Stations, G-III, NASA ER-2
Temporal Resolution: 1 second < Daily
Location: Eastern Pacific, Western United States
Boundary:
- North: 52.654
- South: 20.468
- East: -66.987
- West: -131.705
Spatial Resolutions
| Instrument | Resolution Available |
|---|---|
| AMPR | 0.6-2.8 km footprint based on aircraft elevation |
| ARO | 150-250 km (horizontal), 200-400 m (vertical) |
| AVAPS | < 10 meters in the vertical |
| AWP | < 2 km spatial and 66 m vertical resolution |
| CoSMIR-H | 161 m at surface at 20 km range with 75 m gate spacing. At 20km flight altitude 2.3 km x 3.9 km at a look angle of 53 degrees; 1.4 km x 1.4 km at nadir |
| CPL | L1B: Horizontal: ~200m at 20km flight altitude; Vertical: 30 m; L2: Horizontal: 1km; Vertical: 30 m |
| HALO | 12 km horizontal, 315 m vertical |
| MASTER | 50 m |
| MBARS | 1-4 km |
| Metnav | Point |
| NASTI | 2.6 km |
| Radiosondes | Point |
| S-HIS | 2 km |
Gambacorta, A., A. Kotsakis, R. Kroodsma, E. Nowottnick, S. Serbin, A. Nehrir. 2026. Westcoast & Heartland Hyperspectral Microwave Sensor Intensive Experiment (WH2yMSIE) Collection [indicate subset used]. Data available online [https://earthdata.nasa.gov/centers/ghrc-daac] from the NASA EOSDIS Global Hydrometeorology Resource Center Distributed Active Archive Center, Huntsville, Alabama, U.S.A. doi:10.5067/WHYMSIE/DATA101
Gambacorta, A., A. Kotsakis, R. Kroodsma, E. Nowottnick, S. Serbin, A. Nehrir, M. McLinden, J. MacKinnon, Y. Zhou, N. Shahroudi, S. Nicholls, R. Rosenberg, J. Blaisdell, and R. Swap, "The West-Coast Hyperspectral Microwave Sensor Intensive Experiment (WHYMSIE)," IGARSS 2024 - 2024 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium, Athens, Greece, 2024, pp. 1430-1432. doi:10.1109/IGARSS53475.2024.10641560