Measuring Rain Drops from Space

What does the size of a rain drop matter? Why would scientists require to measure them? Well apparently the size of the raindrops is one of the factors that determines how big a storm will grow. It can also help speculate about how long a storm will last as well as how much rain can be expected to fall.

At the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. NASA meteorologists have been taking three dimensional pictures of raindrops and snowflakes. That in itself may not seem so great, but when you consider that the pictures are actually being taken globally, from outer space, then there is a definite difference.

Joe Munchak, research meteorologist hopes that this study will help them make more accurate weather models in the future. Researchers call the number of raindrops and snowflakes of different sizes at various locations within a cloud the “particle size distribution.” He is hopeful that by co-relating the date with what they already know, the predictions of flash floods will become more accurate as well.

This particular science project may not have been possible if NASA had not partnered with Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) mission. The successful gathering of data will only be surpassed by the predictions the meteorologists make.