Satellite Ocean Winds, Vapor, and Rain Weekly Averages

Remote Sensing Systems provides weekly averaged satellite retrievals of ocean wind speed, atmospheric water vapor, cloud liquid water, and rain rate. The data is produced by NASA's MEaSUREs Program using a unified algorithm refined over 20 years and is available for the DMSP F14 satellite. It is distributed in netCDF format by the Global Hydrology Resource Center.

Use Cases

• Analyzing spatial patterns of ocean surface wind speed for weather and climate models.
• Tracking long-term trends in atmospheric water vapor content over global oceans.
• Studying the relationship between cloud liquid water and precipitation rates in marine environments.
• Validating and calibrating other satellite or model-derived hydrological data products.

Strengths

• Data is intercalibrated across sensor generations (SSM/I to SSMIS) to ensure a consistent 20+ year time series.
• Derived from a unified, physically based algorithm representing two decades of refinements and verifications.
• Provides four key ocean-atmosphere variables (wind, vapor, cloud water, rain) simultaneously from a single source.

Limitations

• Specific row counts, file sizes, and exact temporal coverage are not provided by any source.
• Conflicting 'last updated' dates exist between platforms (2008-08-09 on NASA Earthdata vs. 2026-03-12 on Data.gov).
• Column names and detailed data structure within the netCDF files are not listed.

Provenance

Source

Remote Sensing Systems (RSS), generated for NASA's MEaSUREs Program.

Collection Method

Satellite remote sensing via the Special Sensor Microwave/Imager (SSM/I) and SSMIS on the DMSP F14 platform, with data processed using a unified retrieval algorithm.

Freshness

2026-03-12 22:20:51.935888

Geography

Global ocean coverage.