Early work by Adler et. al., 1985, has postulated that the mode of the 10.7 mm brightness temperature from a GOES satellite for a mature thunderstorm anvil should be fairly close to a proximity equilibrium level. For several proximity soundings, they have shown a reasonable agreement between equilibrium levels derived by sounding and satellite. Although Adler's method of determining equilibrium height compares well with sounding data, radar data would allow a more direct comparison of anvil top height to that of satellite.
This paper will show a comparison between satellite-derived equilibrium temperature (converted to height), radar derived equilibrium height and the equilibrium level height based on proximity soundings for two cases. Also, proximity soundings and/or RUC data updated with recent surface-based temperature and moisture parameters will be used for sounding comparisons. Initial results indicate a tendency for equilibrium level to be dependent on the size of the anvil sample. In other words, the overall convective system may have a different equilibrium level than the embedded individual updrafts. In addition to the multi-sensor comparison, a real-time algorithm will be developed to diagnose the overshoot characteristics using the calculated equilibrium level.