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GIS Resources
National Weather Service
Climate Prediction Center



  • CPC GIS Data
    All CPC web products that have been converted to GIS format (Shapefile and GeoTiff) are available via ftp.
    (If you have any questions concerning any CPC GIS data, please contact viviane.silva@noaa.gov)
  • Land Surface Monitoring and Predition (including U.S. Soil Moisture Monitoring)
    The land surface monitoring and prediction system provides global soil moisture estimates each month and U.S. estimates daily, monthly, and seasonally. In addition to total soil moisture, anomalies, percentiles, and changes are also presented (changes only for U.S.). Data are available for download in both text and GIS formats. Analysis and estimates are based upon the CPC leaky bucket hydrological model. Specifics on the analysis can be found on the site
  • North American Precipitation Analysis
    The CPC daily (1200 - 1200 UTC) rain gauge analysis contains information from over 8000 stations across the US and Mexico each day in near real-time (within 12 hours). The data base includes multiple sources of rain gauge data over the US: "First order" World Meteorological Organization (WMO) Global Telecommunications System (GTS) sites; SHEF (Standard Hydrologic Exchange Format)-encoded precipitation reports from River Forecast Centers; the Hydrometeorological Automated Data System (HADS) dataset; and the USDA SNOTEL [SNOwpack TELemetry] dataset. Mexican precipitation data is provided by the Mexican National Weather Service through a continuing long-term collaboration.
  • North American Drought Briefing
    This web site presents the current U.S. hydro-climate conditions and an objective drought assessment for the recent week, calendar month and three-month season. This activity supports the operational U.S. Drought Monitor and the U.S. Drought Outlook. An objective way to classify drought is to use drought indices. For meteorological drought, the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) is used to measure precipitation deficits. The Standardized Runoff Index (SRI), similar to the SPI, is used to classify hydrological drought. Agricultural drought is measured by monthly mean soil moisture (SM) anomaly percentiles based on probability distributions. The runoff, soil moisture and hydrological variables are based on the products from the North American Data Assimilation. Products from each individual model (Noah, Mosaic, VIC and SAC) and the multi- model ensemble are presented. The atmospheric variables are based on the North American Regional Reanalysis. Anomalies are computed with respect to a common base period 1979-2007. The regional hydrologic section presents area averaged time series of hydrological variables for the recent period for each River Forecast Center.
  • Palmer Drought Severity Index (PDSI) and Crop Moisture Index (CMI)
    Current and historical maps and tabular data for the Palmer Drought Index and the Crop Moisture Index are available on this site. Specifically, the Palmer Drought Index provided is the Palmer Modified Drought Index, a long-term drought index calculated weekly for each U.S. Climate Division. This index is faster to respond to recent rainfall than the hydrological version of the Palmer Drought Index. The Crop Moisture Index is designed to reflect short-term moisture conditions during the growing season. This page also links to maps showing U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) topsoil moisture based on actual reports of soil conditions sent to USDA each week. Under "Soil Moisture Monitoring," there is a link to soil moisture maps based on calculated values of soil moisture. The link to the Experimental Drought Indicator Blends is currently not operational pending development of automated procedures to produce these maps.