Changes to MFRSRCLDOD1MIN Datastream

Abstract

Significant updates were made to the multifilter rotating shadowband radiometer (MFRSR) cloud optical depth (MFRSRCLDOD) value-added product (VAP) in 2011. The original intent of the update was to add quality control (QC) flags and to update the VAP to use the improved retrievals of liquid water path (LWP) from the Microwave Radiometer Retrievals (MWRRET) VAP rather than the statistical retrievals of LWP from the Microwave Radiometer Line of Sight (MWRLOS) datastream. Although this was originally intended to be a straightforward update of the code, it became more complicated due to the following factors: (1) a new developer and translator team were working with the code; (2) numerous small changes had to be made to the code to consistently implement the QC flags; and (3) ARM standards have changed over the years since the code was originally developed.