MAF - Comparison of low-latency & modified NUCAPS soundings

2200Z: While waiting on convection to develop I decided to do a comparison of the low-latency NUCAPS sounding & the slower but boundary layer corrected NUCAPS sounding. I looked at a "green" sounding point just south of KMAF at the 1932Z NOAA-20 pass. For ground truth, the 19Z observation at KMAF was 82 T/58 Td.
SPC mesoanlysis values at 19Z were:
SBCAPE: 1500-2000 J/kg
MLCAPE: 1500-2000 J/kg
MUCAPE: Slightly less than 2000 J/kg

SFC-3 km Lapse rates: 8 C/km
500-700 mb lapse rates: ~6.5 C/km

The low-latency, uncorrected, NUCAPS sounding was much too cool at the surface with a satellite derived surface observation of 76 T/60 Td. However CAPE values were still in line with the SPC mesoanlysis, potentially because the mid-level lapse rates were likely too steep on the NUCAPS soundings

SBCAPE: 1768 J/kg
MLCAPE: 2036 J/kg
MUCAPE: 1680 J/kg

Sfc-3 km lapse rate: 7.7 C/km
850-500 mb 7.3 C/km

Unmodified NUCAPS sounding:

The modified NUCAPS sounding was much closer to the ob at KMAF with a NUCAPS derived sfc ob of 82 T/ 58 Td. CAPE values & lapse rate values were also closer to SPC mesoanlysis which is what you would hope for.

SBCAPE: 1841 J/kg
MLCAPE: 1657 J/kg
MUCAPE: 1841J/kg

SFC-3 km lapse rate: 8.8 C/km
850-500 mb: 7.9 C/km
700-500 mb: 6.6 C/km

Modified NUCAPS sounding:

I still continue to place much more confidence in the modified soundings vs the low-latency unmodified ones. The soundings performed much better today vs yesterday compared to mesoanalysis values (which of course are not ground truth by any means but are about as close as we can get with traditional products). Personally, I would not anticipate myself using the low-latency soundings much knowing that the more accurate modified NUCAPS soundings are only an hour or two away. However I find a great deal of value in both the corrected NUCAPS point soundings & gridded fields in analyizng the early afternoon environment.

Peter Sunday