Hurricane Franklin, the first Atlantic Basin Hurricane in the GOES-R era, approached the east coast of Mexico during the evening of 09 August 2017. One strategy to observe a smooth day/night transition, discussed in a previous blog post, involves combining visible and infrared imagery. For this case, we take it a step further by including the sandwich VIS/IR combo during the day, and transition to just IR at night. The sandwich combo, also discussed in previous posts, has a VIS underlay with a semi-transparent IR overlay of only the coldest cloud tops. GOES-16 was undergoing testing on the 9th, so no 1-min meso sectors were available, leaving “only” 5-min imagery to observe Franklin.
Figure 1: 08 August 2017 VIS/IR Sandwich combo during day transition to IR at night for Hurricane Franklin. Full resolution: https://satelliteliaisonblog.files.wordpress.com/2017/08/20170809_hurr_transition_sw2_anno.gif
-Bill Line, NWS
“The GOES-16 data posted on this page are preliminary, non-operational data and are undergoing testing. Users bear all responsibility for inspecting the data prior to use and for the manner in which the data are utilized.”
Satellite Liaison Blog 
