Minutes of the Meeting in Amsterdam September 25, 2007

Committee Attendees

Guest Attendees

  • Jeff Hawkins, Naval Research Lab
  • Tom Lee, Naval Research Lab
  • Carl Hoffman, NPOESS IP

Repeat Joint Meeting

The committee resolved to repeat the current joint meeting with EUMETSAT, based on the spectacular success of the joint meeting, with 604 attendees, and a high level of interest from all parties on both sides of the Atlantic in doing so. There are some decisions to be made:

  • Frequency: how often should we repeat? (Three or six years synchronizes the timing between our 18-month repeat and EUMETSAT's 12 month annual meetings.) One mitigation for the "infrequency" of six years could be to hold joint sessions at intermediate meetings.
  • Location: should the next meeting be in the US, and should the location alternate between Europe and the US? If in the US, we should choose an east-coast site to minimize cost and inconvenience (not west coast) to the Europeans; Denver or mid-west sites would be fine-it should be easy to fly in to. If held in Europe, we would get much stronger European participation, and more diversity. EUMETSAT director Lars Prahm invited AMS to hold it as soon as possible. Gary Davis recommended a European location for attendance.
  • Timing: when should the next one be (related to frequency)? Many said, do this ASAP. EUMETSAT has set their 2008 meeting for Darmstadt, and the meeting in 2009 is also pretty fixed. They have initial thoughts on their venue in 2010, though this is flexible. The SatMet meeting in January 2009 will be in Phoenix with the annual meeting. We have freedom of location in summer/fall 2010 as it is our specialty meeting. Our subsequent opportunity is the annual meeting in January 2012, depending on location. However, the annual meeting would lose the intimacy of the specialty meeting. Perhaps a joint meeting in six years would work best, summer/fall 2013, although some felt this was a long time to wait.

Review of Minutes of Previous Meeting

Phil reviewed notes from the previous meeting and took the action to clean them up and post them online.

Selection of New Committee Members

Five committee members have terms expiring in 2008:

    • Bob Atlas, NOAA/AOML
    • Gerry Dittberner, NOAA/NESDIS
    • Pete Robertson, NASA/MSFC
    • Rolf Stuhlmann, EUMETSAT
    • Joe Turk, Naval Research Lab.
  • It is important to preserve the EUMETSAT connection; action-Rolf Stuhlmann, who needs to ask Joe Schmetz, and will report back with a recommendation as to whether his term will be extended or with EUMETSAT's suggestion for a new member.
  • Gary Davis suggested we bring on a NOAA/NESDIS member with the stability and seniority of Gerry Dittberner (the GOES-R project scientist could fill this role, or Michael Tanner?)
  • A member from NESDIS STAR, either Mitch Goldberg, Steve Goodman, or Shoba Kondragunta; action-Phil will work with Mitch to determine who best represents NESDIS/NOAA/STAR
  • GOES-R project scientist (name is tbd pending selection/acceptance)
  • New CIRA member Steve Miller (would add CIRA to SatMet committee)
  • NRL - Nancy Baker, Rolf Langland (would preserve NRL role)
  • ASA representatives- Michael Goodman (would preserve NASA/MSFC role)
  • Industry - Ron Birk, Bob Allen (NG), Debra Smith (would add 2nd industry member)
  • NWS - Steve Olsen
  • University - Prof. Guosheng Liu (Florida State University)
  • All committee members are asked to submit their suggestions/votes for the replacement five.
  • Roger Wakimoto has asked us to make sure to preserve or expand diversity on the committee
  • Chris indicated that we have the option of expanding the committee by one member to increase diversity

Consideration of Advanced GEO Sounder Consensus Statement

  • Phil explained HES removal from the GOES-R flight manifest, and the recent workshop NRC put together to identify possible strategies for re-manifesting climate and applications sensors on NPOESS and GOES-R.
  • We discussed drafting a consensus statement in time for the upcoming NRC committee meeting (October 9) about the need for an advanced geostationary sounder.
  • Tim suggested that the statement should be a more general "move forward" statement (to restore US leadership and not be extremely risk adverse at the expense of progress), rather than just focus on sounder.
  • Lars asked us to be sure to define "who" we are speaking for. The National Weather Association has put together a support statement.
  • Phil's motion was to try to build the consensus statement. It was seconded by Chris.
  • Phil has the action to draft and circulate this statement to the committee.

Preview of 2008 AMS Annual Meeting (New Orleans, LA, 20-24 January 2008)

  • We will not have a formal SatMet conference, but we will have a STAC meeting
  • The GOES User Conference (GUC) will be held on Wed/Thurs, with Tuesday covering Space Weather
  • There will be a data assimilation short course
  • There will be an NPOESS-only session with a societal-benefits agenda
  • NPOESS is eager to show the socioeconomic benefits they bring, and is open to any and all help in doing so. The NPOESS IPO, specifically Carl Hoffman, would like any reports/literature documenting potential NPOESS societal benefits
  • There is a Tuesday or Wednesday breakfast for our STAC meeting

Selection of 2009 AMS Satellite Meteolorogy and Oceanography Conference Chair (Phoenix, AZ, 11-15 January)

  • Phil Ardanuy was nominated as conference chair by Wayne Feltz and this was seconded by Tim Schmit.
  • Phil asked Wayne Feltz to be the conference co-chair, and Wayne accepted.
  • First members of the planning committee include Joe Turk, and Tim Schmit. 1

Selection of 2010 AMS Satellite Meteolorogy and Oceanography Conference Venue

  • Miami - Bob Atlas, but note that there is the potential for tropical storms in September, and the December 2008 direct readout conference is there
  • Omaha - AFWA - John Zapotocny - logistical help...
  • Washington DC - for synergy with GOES, PolarMax (usually $35 fee in DC area), possibly at College Park (U of Maryland)
  • Raleigh/Durham - Research Triangle Park, suggested by local promotion group
  • Ft Collins/Boulder/Denver - Chris suggests this as a possible 2013 site, if this is the European joint meeting
  • All committee members are asked to rank these and to submit their alternate suggestions
  • Action: Lars will find out auditorium availability and NOAA College Park construction schedule 2
  • Action: Tim will follow up on getting a GUC meeting aligned with 2010 AMS satellite meeting

Discussion of prospective short courses (2009) - Tom Lee, Joe Turk

  • Joint with NWP conference
  • Alternatives of one-day Symposium, short course on Sunday, dedicated parallel session, or short course during conference
    • Data Assimilation
    • Operational Applications
    • Environmental Applications
    • Retrievals
    • Clouds
    • Programmatic
  • Tom Lee: ideas to research, and further brainstorming; wants a committee member to help; How MODIS products anticipate VIIRS and GOES-R; outreach on imagery products. Outreach/training course for Imagery products, IPO, Action: talk to co-chairs of AMS Annual 2009 meeting so committee chairs can coordinate, start with Claudia Gorski to find out about 1-day symposium, broadcasters in AMS 2009 so another group to coordinate with. Wayne Feltz agreed to be the committee POC
  •  
  • Joe Turk: data assimilation-could hold some really neat joint sessions-can have during the week, and potentially more than one (Joe and Lars to lead)

New satellite items for web site

  • Concerns about inconsistent launch dates for satellites across web pages
  • Action Item: Tim Schmit and Jeff Hawkins will work on developing a consistent set of launch dates

Other items and issues

  • COMET is developing the online Environmental Satellite Resource Center (ESRC)

AMS Glossary

  • Update with latest satellite acronyms: Ken Heideman, AMS. GEO done, now working on LEO

1(A thought: it might be interesting to have a session held using Google Earth, AWIPS II and McIDAS V)

2 Lars Peter reports back that "The auditorium in the new NOAA building will reportedly hold several hundred people (one number floated when I asked about it was 500). The current schedule says that the move will commence in December 2008 and be completed by May 2009. Even with some slip we should be OK for a potential 2010 meeting."