“…The advent of the TERRA and AQUA satellite sensor systems launched by NASA in 1999 and 2002 respectively with a number of sensors on each platform [LaMoreaux, 2001] has contributed to the availability of data for land and atmosphere for soil moisture, temperature, precipitation, vegetation, atmospheric temperature and water vapor to name a few variables. These data along with ground observations from either established in situ networks such as the Oklahoma Mesonet [Basara and Crawford, 2000] or opportunity based experiments such as the Southern Great Plains 1997 experiment (SGP97) [Jackson et al, 2002] have been assimilated in hydrological models [McLaughlin, 2002]. There has been a large body of work in the past decades that utilize satellite data [Lakshmi and Susskind, 2001;Boni et al, 2001;Walker and Houser, 2001;Lakshmi, 2000].…”