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Description

The Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites (GOES) operated by the United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) support weather forecasting, severe storm tracking, meteorology and oceanography research. Generally there are several GOES satellites in geosynchronous orbit at any one time viewing different earth locations including the GOES-13 launched 24 May 2006. The radiometer aboard the satellite, The GOES N-P Imager, is a five channel (one visible, four infrared) imaging radiometer designed to sense radiant and solar reflected energy from sampled areas of the earth. The multi-element spectral channels simultaneously sweep east-west and west-east along a north-to-south path by means of a two-axis mirror scan system retuning telemetry in 10-bit precision. For this Group for High Resolution Sea Surface Temperature (GHRSST) dataset, skin sea surface temperature (SST) measurements are calculated from the far IR channels of GOES-13 at full resolution on a half hourly basis. In native satellite projection, vertically adjacent pixels are averaged and read out at every pixel. L2P datasets including Single Sensor Error Statistics (SSES) are then derived following the GHRSST Data Processing Specification (GDS) version 2.0. The full disk image is subsetted into granules representing distinct northern and southern regions.

Product Summary

Platforms
GOES-15
Instruments
GOES-15 Imager
Spatial Extent

N: 68 S: -68 E: -0 W: -155

Spatial Resolution
4200 Meters x 4600 Meters
Location
ATLANTIC OCEAN ,
GLOBAL
Coordinate System
CARTESIAN
Granule Spatial Representation
CARTESIAN
Temporal Extent
2013-08-01 to 2018-01-08
Data Partner
Physical Oceanography Distributed Active Archive Center, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, NASA (NASA/JPL/PODAAC)
Concept ID
C2499940523-POCLOUD
Data State
COMPLETE
Number of Files/Granules
145304
Processing Level
2P
Published
Updated
Science Keywords
Sea Surface Temperature

Citation

Citation is critically important for dataset documentation and discovery. This dataset is openly shared, without restriction, in accordance with the EOSDIS Data Use and Citation Guidance.

Copy Citation

NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). (2014). GHRSST Level 2P Western Atlantic Regional Skin Sea Surface Temperature from the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites (GOES) Imager on the GOES-13 satellite (GDS version 2) [Data set]. NASA Physical Oceanography Distributed Active Archive Center. https://doi.org/10.5067/GHG13-2PO02 Date Accessed: 2026-04-12

Documents

Variables

The table below lists the variables contained within a single granule for this dataset. Variables often contain observed or derived geophysical measurements collected from a variety of sources, including remote sensing instruments on satellite and airborne platforms, field campaigns, in situ measurements, and model outputs. The terms variable, parameter, scientific data set, layer, and band have been used across NASA’s Earth science disciplines; however, variable is the designated nomenclature in NASA’s Common Metadata Repository (CMR). Variable metadata attributes such as Name, Description, Units, Data Type, Fill Value, Valid Range, and Scale Factor allow users to efficiently process and analyze the data. The full range of attributes may not be applicable to all variables. Additional information on variable attributes is typically available in the data, user guide, and/or other product documentation.

For questions on a specific variable, please use the Earthdata Forum.

Name Description Units Data Type Fill Value Valid Range Scale Factor Offset
adi_dtime_from_sst Difference in hours between the ADI and SST data hour byte -128 -127 to 127 1 127
aerosol_dynamic_indicator Estimate of the potential for aerosol contamination count byte -128 -127 to 127 0.01 1.27
diurnal_warming Estimate of diurnal warming using Gentemann (2003) diurnal warming parameterization Kelvin byte -128 -127 to 127 0.05 N/A
dt_analysis Analysis used is NOAAs Real-time Global SST analysis at high resolution (0.083 degree) kelvin byte -128 -127 to 127 0.1 N/A
l2p_flags The flags are important to preperly use the data. N/A short 127 127 to -128 -128 -128
lat latitude from McIDAS derived data degrees_north float -3.4028235E+38 -90 to 90 1 N/A
lon longitude from McIDAS derived data degrees_east float -3.4028235E+38 -180 to 180 1 N/A
probability_of_clear_sky Clear sky probability from Bayesian analysis; non-standard L2P field probability byte -128 -127 to 127 0.0002 0.975
quality_level Proximity code defined as : 0 = unprocessed 1 = Cloudy (Clear sky probability < 0.800) 2 = Bad (0.800 <= Clear sky probability < 0.950) 3 = Suspect (0.950 <= Clear sky probability < 0.990) 4 = Acceptable (0.990 <= Clear sky probability < 0.999) 5 = Excellent (0.999 <= Clear sky probability) N/A byte 0 0 to 5 1 N/A
satellite_zenith_angle The satellite zenith angle at the time of the SST observation angular_degree byte -128 -90 to 90 1 N/A
sea_ice_fraction Fractional sea ice cover from NCEP GFS estimate fraction byte -128 0 to 1 0.01 N/A
sea_surface_temperature Skin temperature of the ocean kelvin short -32768 -5000 to 5000 0.01 273.15
solar_zenith_angle The solar zenith angle at the time of the SST observation angular_degree byte -128 0 to -76 1 N/A
sses_bias Estimated bias based on NOAA bias scheme (contact Andy.Harris@noaa.gov) kelvin byte -128 -127 to 127 0.02 N/A
sses_standard_deviation Estimated standard deviation based on NOAA bias scheme (contact Andy.Harris@noaa.gov) kelvin byte -128 -127 to 127 0.01 1
sst_dtime time plus sst_dtime gives seconds after 00:00:00 UTC January 1, 1981 second short -32768 -32767 to 32767 1 N/A
time time in seconds since 1981-01-01 00:00:00 seconds since 1981-01-01 00:00:00 int N/A N/A 1 N/A
wind_speed These wind speeds were created by NCEP and represent windows at 10 metres above the sea surface m s-1 byte -128 -127 to 127 1 N/A
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