WEBVTT

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[ off camera ] “Everyone is familiar with rain. It literally falls in our backyard, but

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did you know there’s actually a lot we really still don’t know about

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rain and snowfall. NASA’s getting ready to launch a new mission that’s going

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to measure both rain and snow all around the world here

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to tell us a little bit more about this new mission is Dr. Dalia Kirschbaum

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here to tell us a little bit more about this new mission is Dr. Dalia Kirschbaum

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from NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, MD. Thanks for joining us.” [ Kirschbaum ] “Thanks for having me.”

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[ off camera ] “So in a couple of hours NASA is going to launch a new satellite

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 that’s going to measure rain and snowfall all around the world. What’s so special about this mission?”

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[ Kirschbaum ] “Well we’re really excited about the GPM core observatory. 

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The Global Precipitation Measurement mission is actually co-led by NASA and JAXA

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and it’s going to provide the most advanced instruments we’ve ever had to measure

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everything from light rain to heavy rain and snow.

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But in addition to this core satellite, it’s going to be the flagship for an international satellite

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constellation that together will give us a global picture of rain and

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snow everywhere in the world, every three hours.”

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[ off camera ] “Why do we need to measure precipitation from space?” [Kirschbaum] “It’s really

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 important to measure precipitation and get a global picture of what’s happening. We want

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 important to measure precipitation and get a global picture of what’s happening. We want

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to know what’s happening in our backyards, but it’s equally as important to know where our weather is coming from

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or what’s happening around the other side of the world. Now rain gauges 

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can give us information of a specific point. But if you actually take all of the rain gauges in the

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world they only fit into two basketball courts. Radar are a little bit better.

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Radar gives you a broader coverage, but there are a lot of areas around the world where we have

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no coverage at all like over the oceans or developing countries. And so having 

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that vantage point of space gives us a lot of power and understanding

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how precipitation is moving or changing and how that may be changing

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in a changing climate.” [ off camera ] “How will GPM improve monitoring

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for hazards like hurricanes and floods?” [ Kirschbaum ] “Well GPM has some pretty 

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amazing tools that can let us look three-dimensionally through storms

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with a dual frequency radar. And so layer-by-layer

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we can get a sense of what’s happening in the clouds and what’s happening with the precipitation.

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The other satellite instrument is sort of like an X-ray 

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whereas the radar is like a CAT Scan. And together these two instruments can diagnose 

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what’s happening. So if you look at Hurricane Katrina for example, you see these big

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red spikes which are hot towers, these huge convective towers.

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And so having this information from a three dimensional perspective gives us

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critical clues into understanding how a storm is intensifying and where

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it might be moving. And so for weather forecasters and hurricane modelers, they

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use that information to get a sense of where to make evacuations

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and how to better understand the dynamics of these storms.”

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[ off camera ] “Why is it important to study rain and snowfall in a changing climate?”

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[ Kirschbaum ] “Well knowing where, when and how much it’s raining or snowing is so important

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for everything for understanding extreme events like floods. If you look at floods we

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need to know. You know everywhere in the world there’s a flood at least once a day. 

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And so floods and their counterpart landslides are

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caused by extreme precipitation. On the flip side looking at drought.

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And the most important thing is to look at how our weather is changing every

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day and how that changes in a changing climate. So we need to look

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from day to day scale all the way to what’s happening far into the future.”

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[ off camera ] “Where can we learn more?” [Kirschbaum] “You can learn more at

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NASA.GOV/GPM where we have a whole host of animations and visualizations

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that tell us about this exciting mission coming up.”

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[ off camera ] “Thanks so much for joining us.” [Kirschbaum] “Thanks for having me.”