Abstract
The launch of the first Defense Meteorological Satellite Program (DMSP) special sensor microwave imager (SSM/I) on June 19, 1987, was of particular significance to the polar research community in that it extended the series of polar‐orbiting passive microwave imager s which began with the Nimbus 5 electrically scanning microwave radiometer (ESMR) in 1972 and continued until August 1987 with the Nimbus 7 scanning multichannel microwave radiometer (SMMR). Six additional SSM/I instruments will be launched over the next 2 decades as part of the DMSP program.In 1982, in recognition of the importance of the SSM/I to the polar research community, NASA established a program to process, archive, and distribute gridded SSM/I microwave radiances and derived sea ice concentrations for both polar regions. A key element of this effort was the initiation of a sea ice validation program for the purpose of providing the user community a measure of the precision and accuracy of the derived sea ice products. Sea ice remote sensing specialists were invited to serve on the NASA sea ice validation team to define and implement the program [Cavalieri and Swift, 1987]. A parallel program which included other geophysical parameters was established by the Department of Defense under the leadership of J. P. Hollinger at the Naval Research Laboratory [Hollinger, 1989].
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