Southern Great Plains 1999 (SGP99) experiment: overview and passive microwave satellite data analyses

The Southern Great Plains (SGP) 1999 Experiment was conducted to address significant gaps in the knowledge base on the microwave remote sensing of soil moisture. Several unique aircraft based instruments (C, S and L band) participated in the field campaign in Oklahoma. Aircraft and ground based data collection was conducted between July 8th and July 20th. An excellent sequence of meteorological conditions occurred during the experiment. Data collected by the TMI and SSM/I instruments were processed and compared to soil moisture observations. Results support previous experiments in this region using SSM/I data and provide new information on potential improvements that the TMI can provide. Comparisons of the SSM/I and TMI data at 19 and 37 GHz allows the analysis of the effects of spatial resolution on soil moisture retrieval.