UTILIZATION OF HURRICANE SPECIFIC GLOBAL PRECIPITATION MEASUREMENT-BASED PRECIPITATION AND LATENT HEAT RETRIEVALS TO IMPROVE OPERATIONAL FORECASTS OF RAPIDLY INTENSIFYING HURRICANE EVENTS CIRA SCIENTISTS HAVE GREATLY CONTRIBUTED TO AND ARE WORLDWIDE EXPERTS IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF NOW-OPERATIONAL STATISTICAL-DYNAMICAL FORECAST TECHNIQUES THAT COMBINE MODEL-FORECASTED TROPICAL CYCLONE DIAGNOSTICS WITH INITIAL SATELLITE-BASED OBSERVATIONS. SPECIFIC EXAMPLES INCLUDE THE RAPID INTENSIFICATION INDEX AND THE OPERATIONAL STATISTICAL-DYNAMICAL HURRICANE INTENSITY GUIDANCE USED AT THE NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER. IN THIS WORK WE PROPOSE TO 1) EXPAND THE CAPABILITIES OF THE HURRICANE VERSION OF THE GODDARD PROFILING ALGORITHM BY ADDING ESTIMATES OF LATENT HEATING 2) EXPLORE THE USE OF H-GPROF-BASED PRECIPITATION/LATENT HEATING INFORMATION AS A MORE DIRECT PREDICTOR OF RAPID INTENSIFICATION (RI AS DEFINED BY THE 90TH PERCENTILE OF INTENSITY CHANGE) 3) DEVELOP A H-GPROF BASED ALGORITHM TO IMPROVE THE PREDICTION OF RI 4) TRANSFER BOTH THE H-GPROF CAPABILITIES AND RI ALGORITHM TO NHC OPERATIONS AND 5) PROVIDE DISPLAY CAPABILITIES OF GLOBAL PRECIPITATION MEASUREMENT (GPM)/H-GPROF INFORMATION ON N-AWIPS AND AWIPS-II. THE DISCOVERIES FOUND BY EXPLORING THE H-GPROF DATA WITH RESPECT TO RI WILL ALSO RESULT IN INCREASED FORECASTER KNOWLEDGE THROUGH FORECASTER-FOCUSED TRAINING. THE EXPERTISE OF SPORT WILL BE USED TO PROVIDE DISPLAY CAPABILITIES FOR THE GPM DATA AND PROVIDE TRAINING BASED ON OUR FINDINGS. H-GPROF HAS DRASTICALLY REDUCED THE KNOWN BIASES ASSOCIATED WITH THE MORE GENERAL GPROF ALGORITHM (KUMMEROW ET AL. 2015). FOR INSTANCE H-GPROF RAIN RATE ERRORS RELATIVE TO THE PR ARE REDUCED BY 20% COMPARED TO GPROF WITH THE LARGEST IMPROVEMENTS IN BOTH LOWEST AND HIGHEST RAIN RATES. VERTICAL PROFILE RETRIEVALS FOR FOUR HYDROMETEORS ARE ALSO ENHANCED AS ERROR IS REDUCED BY 30% COMPARED TO THE GPROF RETRIEVAL RELATIVE TO PR ESTIMATES. WHEN COMPARED TO THE FULL DATABASE OF RAINING SCENES IN TROPICAL CYCLONES H-GPROF ALSO IMPROVES THE RMSE AND MAE OF RAIN RATE ESTIMATES OVER THOSE FROM GPROF BY ABOUT 22% AND 27% RESPECTIVELY. SIMILAR IMPROVEMENTS ARE ALSO SEEN IN THE OVERALL RAIN RATE BIAS IN RAIN RATES FOR HURRICANES IN THE DATABASE WHICH IS REDUCED FROM 0.20 MM HR-1 TO -0.06 MM HR-1. THE DEVELOPMENT OF LATENT HEATING ESTIMATES IS ALSO EXPECTED TO BE A DRAMATIC IMPROVEMENT OVER THE MORE GENERAL GPROF ALGORITHM. PAST EFFORTS TO INCLUDE PASSIVE MICROWAVE (MI) INFORMATION IN THE FORECAST OF RI HAVE CONCENTRATED ON THE USE OF PATTERNS IN MULTIPLE CHANNELS THAT ARE IN ESSENCE RELATED DIRECTLY TO PRECIPITATION BE IT STRATIFORM OR CONVECTIVE IN THE INNER REGION OF THE TROPICAL CYCLONE (E.G. ROZOFF ET AL. 2015 KIEPER AND JIANG 2012). IN OUR ASSESSMENT USING THE PRECIPITATION AND LATENT HEATING INFORMATION PROVIDED BY H-GPROF WILL PROVIDE A MORE DIRECT AND ELEGANT APPROACH TO THE FORECAST PROBLEM. THE WORK PLAN WOULD CONCENTRATE ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE LATENT HEATING ESTIMATES AND EXPLORATION OF H-GPROF INFORMATION IN YEAR-1 WITH DEVELOPING THE RI ALGORITHM OPERATIONAL TRANSITION AND TRAINING DEVELOPMENT IN YEAR-2. IN COMMUNICATION WITH NHC (PERSONAL COMMUNICATION 2016) NHC WOULD FULLY SUPPORT THE METHOD AND IS EXCITED ABOUT SPORT PROVIDING TECHNICAL SUPPORT TO DISPLAY GPM AND H-GPROF INFORMATION ON NHC S OPERATIONAL SYSTEMS AND TO PROVIDE FOCUSED TRAINING ON THIS TOPIC.