TRMM observations of the global relationship between ice water content and lightning

[1] This study uses TRMM lightning and radar observations to study the fundamental relationship between precipitation ice mass and lightning flash density. The results indicate that the physical assumptions of precipitation-based charging and mixed phase precipitation development are robust and that on a global scale, the relationship between precipitation ice water path and lightning flash density is relatively invariant between land, ocean and coastal regimes. Hence lightning data may be a useful variable for inclusion in combined space borne algorithms designed to retrieve ice water content. Citation: Petersen, W. A., H. J. Christian, and S. A. Rutledge (2005), TRMM observations of the global relationship between ice water content and lightning, Geophys. Res. Lett., 32, L14819, doi:10.1029/2005GL023236.