Estimation of the Diurnal Cycle of Oceanic Precipitation from SSM/I Data

Abstract

A study of differences between the morning and evening monthly rainfall for 5° ? 5° cells over the oceans from the SSM/I data has been conducted. The monthly rainfalls are estimated from the technique given by Wilheit et al. The difference between the morning and evening monthly rainfall arises due to the various random errors involved in the retrieval process, the sampling error in the observations, and the diurnal component of oceanic rainfall. The diurnal component is weak but clearly visible when averaged over large areas and for long time periods. The analysis shows that morning rainfall is consistently greater than evening rainfall. The Northern Hemisphere seems to have a larger diurnal variation than does the Southern Hemisphere. The maximum ratio between the morning and evening monthly rainfall is 1.7 while 1.2 is the more typical value.