Severe spring thunderstorms frequently spawned tornadoes from the Gulf Coast north and eastward during the past week. Gulf moisture clashing with frontal systems moving over the United States provided much of the fuel for intense showers and severe thunderstorms. Flash flooding was often the result of the sudden onset of extremely heavy rainfall. Over 305 mm (12 inches) of rain was reported in southern Mississippi in a few hours one morning on April 28, 2016. NASA's Integrated Multi-satellitE Retrievals for GPM (IMERG) data were used to estimate the amount of rain that fell from April 22-29

There continues to be intermittent anomalies in the F17 37v channel. The science team is in the process of making a decision on how to proceed forward with the F17 SSMIS data. PPS will be halting L1C forward production of the F17 data until a decision is reached. Please note that this information pertains only to the PPS Standard Research products. Additional information will be sent for NRT (Near realtime) as appropriate. We apologize for any inconvenience or problems that this may cause and appreciate your continued patience. We will send notification updates whenever we receive new

As expected, tropical cyclone Fantala reversed course and moved southeastward almost directly over it's earlier track. The tropical cyclone's intensity also fluctuated. Maximum winds dropped significantly as Fantala moved southeastward but have rebounded somewhat today. The GPM core observatory satellite flew over the tropical cyclone on April 19, 2016 at 1346Z when winds had dropped to about 95 kts (109 mph). At that time GPM's Microwave Imager (GMI) and Dual-Frequency Precipitation Radar (DPR) found that Fantala still contained extremely heavy rainfall in storms spiraling into the tropical

A slow-moving frontal system associated with a stagnant upper-air pattern set the stage for heavy rains and flooding early this week from East Texas all the way up through the Central and Northern Plains. The hardest hit region was in and around the Houston area. On Monday, the National Weather Service reported that Houston International Airport broke its all time daily rainfall record with 9.92 inches of rain. Elsewhere in Harris County, over 17 inches of rain was recorded as of Monday evening. The main culprit was a stationary upper-level low pressure center spinning over the Central Rockies

Beginning on April 6, anomalies in the input SSMIS F17 precipitation estimates were detected in the IMERG Early and Late runs. These anomalies manifest as episodic “swath shaped” areas of high precipitation over land which appear to affect most orbits to some degree. The root cause is degradation in the 37 GHz V polarization channel. On April 13 the issue was somewhat mitigated but we continue to monitor the situation. Please let us know if you detect these (or other anomalies) in the IMERG Early and Late Runs after April 13.