GMI Pre-Ship Review On January 30th and 31st, 2012, the GPM Microwave Imager (GMI) underwent its Pre-Shipment Review at Ball Aerospace in Boulder, Colorado. The GMI has successfully completed acoustic testing, vibration testing, and electromagnetic and thermal vacuum testing at the Ball facility. The instrument will be delivered to Goddard Space Flight Center on February 29th and will be integrated onto the GPM Core Observatory satellite over the coming year. This multi-channel, conical-scanning, microwave radiometer will provide an integrated view of precipitation over 13 different microwave

Chris Kidd is a hydrologist at Goddard Space Flight Center. This week he is at the CARE site in Ontario and writes to us about this week's flights. Isn’t it strange how the best snow tends to occur on the same day of the week; when I was little it was always a Thursday. Last Saturday we had a good lake effect snowfall over Barrie (Ontario), this Saturday we had another 6 inches of snow. The forecast proved to accurate in terms of the timing; a 3:15 am start from the hotel to drive out to the field site and prepare for the days operations; the first flakes of snow started to fall as I arrived

Chris Kidd is a hydrologist at Goddard Space Flight Center. This week he is at the CARE site in Ontario and writes to us about this week's flights. Although the excitement of the lake-effect snow last weekend was welcome, in contrast this week was somewhat benign. There were a number of good opportunities identified in the model forecasts that didn’t really materialize, leaving us with a number of, although marginal, still useful events. The dual-frequency radar at the CARE site Friday, February 17th. The little spec in the sky is the Citation aircraft flying overhead. Credit: NASA / Chris