Band
Description
F-Sheet
ABI Guide
Band 1-Blue Visible
Primarily used to identifiy aerosols such as smoke, haze, and clouds during the day.
Band 2 - Red Visible
Daytime detection of fogs and clouds.
Band 3 - Veggie IR
Can be used for identifying aerosols and daytime clouds.
Band 4 - Cirrus Near IR
Effective at detecting very high and thin clouds during the day.
Band 5 - Snow & Ice
Daytime snow and ice identification.
Band 6 - Particle Size
Estimating cloud particle size.
Band 7 - Shortwave IR
Detecting fog and low clouds at night.
Band 8 - Upper WV
Identifying large-scale upper-level patterns.
Band 9 - Mid WV
Detecting mid-level shortwaves.
Band 10 - Low WV
Detecting jet streaks & shortwave features
Band 11 - Cloud Top Phase
Determining cloud composition.
Band 12 - Ozone
Ozone detection.
Band 13 - Clean IR
Traditional infrared imagery.
Band 14 - Longwave IR
Traditional infrared imagery used to determine cloud temperatures and height at night.
Band 15 - Dirty LW IR
Close to traditional IR.
Band 16 - CO2
Estimating tropospheric air temperature.
RGB True Color
Daytime only - combines bands 1, 2 & 3.
NT Microphysics
Composite infrared used to distinguish different cloud types, especially low level stratus and fog.
Airmass
Composite infrared that identifies air masses, jet streams, jet streaks, and vorticity maxima.
Day Cloud Phase
Distinguish between surface features and cloud types - Daytime only.
Sandwich
The benefit of the VIS/IR Sandwich RGB is that it combines the high spatial detail apparent of the visible channel (in this case band 3), with the temperature information of the IR (here, band 13)