An algorithm for snow and ice detection using AVHRR data An extension to the APOLLO software package

Abstract The AVHRR (Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer) Processing scheme Over Land, cLbud and Ocean (APOLLO) is used to extract surface and cloud parameters from satellite data. Before these parameters can be computed, it is necessary to distinguish between land and ocean surfaces and to apply algorithms for the detection of partially cloudy and cloud-filled pixels. In regions with seasonal or permanent snow and ice coverage the separation of clouds becomes much more difficult or often impossible. For this reason, and to find cloud-free and partly cloudy snow and ice pixels,- a day-time algorithm has been developed which uses all five AVHRR channels as follows: The threshold testing of the reflected part of channel-3 radiance leads to a definite distinction between snow/ice and water clouds due, to the clouds much higher reflectivity at 3.7 μm. The detection; of sea ice is based on threshold tests of visible reflectances and, in particular, of the temperature difference between channels-4 and -5. Snow is identified if a high visible reflectance is combined with a low reflectance in channel-3 and with a ratio of channel-2 to channel-1 reflectances similar to that of a cloud. The latter criterion is also mostly suitable to distinguish between snow-covered and snow-free ice areas. Some tests of this algorithm applied to AVHRR data from the 1987 Baltic Sea ice season have shown reasonable classification results with the exception of a few areas with ice clouds or with ice topped water clouds.