Winds from ABI on the GOES-R Series

Abstract With the launches of GOES-16 and GOES-17, higher spatial and temporal winds are now being generated from measurements obtained from the Advanced Baseline Imager (ABI). The GOES-R Series ABI offers more spectral bands (that enable new and improved winds), higher spatial resolution (to better monitor small-scale features), faster imaging (to improve temporal sampling and to scan additional regions), and excellent image navigation and registration (INR) performance (that improves feature tracking), all of which enable high-quality winds to be generated. The GOES-R Series of satellites provides operational estimates of wind speed and direction every 60 min over the full disk, every 15 min over the contiguous United States (CONUS), and every 5 min over movable mesoscale sectors. The quality of the estimated winds is good and compares well to wind observations from rawinsondes and commercial aircraft. The GOES-R Series winds are a critical part of the Global Observing System and an important input to global and regional numerical weather prediction (NWP) data assimilation systems. At the same time, the data provide weather analysts in the field with wind observations that improve their situational awareness and ability to provide high-quality forecasts.