Comparison of Spatial and Temporal Cloud Coverage Derived from CloudSat, CERES, ISCCP and Their Relationship with Precipitation Over Africa

Abstract

The spatial and temporal cloud coverage derived by CloudSat, CERES, ISCCP satellite observations and their relationship with GPCP and TRMM precipitation in West, East and South of Africa were analyzed in this study. CloudSat, CERES and ISCCP show that the high spatial cloud coverage is more frequent in equatorial regions mainly due to more strong convection than other regions. CloudSat shows a low temporal cloud coverage than CERES and ISCCP which are close. Only ISCCP was used to investigate seasonal and temporal variability of different cloud types. The stratocumulus, altostratus, and cirrus clouds are the low, middle and high cloud types with high cloud coverage during JJA, JJA, MAM in West of Africa, during SON, JJA, MAM in East of Africa, and during SON, DJF, DJF in South of Africa respectively . The correlation between cloud coverage and precipitation dataset generally shows a low positive correlation in East of Africa probably due to GPCP and TRMM observations biases whereas a high positive correlation in West and South of Africa. Only middle clouds level in East of Africa, both low and middle in West of Africa show negative correlation with precipitation, whereas all cloud types level in South of Africa show a positive correlation with precipitation.