A neural network method for monitoring snowstorm: A case study in southern China

It has been observed that low temperature, rainfall, snowfall, frost have never occurred over the past 50 years in the southern China, and weather in this area is very complex, so the monitoring equipments are few. Optical and thermal infrared remote sensing is influenced much by clouds, so the passive microwave Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer-Earth Observing System (AMSR-E) data are the best choice to monitor and analyze the development of disaster. In order to improve estimation accuracy, the dynamic learning neural network was used to retrieve snow depth. The difference of brightness temperatures of TB_18.7V and TB_36.5V, TB_18.7H and TB_36.5H, TB_23.8V and TB_89V, TB_23.8H and TB_89H are made as four main input nodes and the snow depth is the only one output node of neural network. The mean and the standard deviation of retrieval errors are about 4.8 cm and 6.7 cm relative to the test data of ground measurements. The application analysis indicated that the neural network can be utilized to monitor the change of snow intensity distribution through passive microwave data in the complex weather of the southern China.