VOL. 12, NO. 10, MAY 2017 ISSN 1819-6608 ARPN Journal of Engineering and Applied Sciences © 2006-2017 Asian Research Publishing Network (ARPN). All rights reserved. www.arpnjournals.com 3233 THE APPLICATION OF VISIBLE IMAGES FROM METEOROLOGICAL SATELLITE (METSAT) FOR THE RAINFALL ESTIMATION IN KLANG RIVER BASIN Intan Shafeenar Ahmad Mohtar and Wardah Tahir Faculty of Civil Engineering, Universiti Teknologi Mara, Shah Alam, Selangor, Malaysia E-Mail: intanshafeenar@gmail.com ABSTRACT The flood problem is unpredictable disasters that impose severe effects to the economy, environment, health and to human being. Flood in Malaysia is a common problem due to the climate condition itself. It has causes high amount of rainfall produced throughout the year and formed by monsoon and convective rainfall formation. Therefore, as a solution to the flood problem, an improved technology has to be implemented to control the flood impacts. There are many problem associated with rainfall conventional collecting method as the data obtained not accurate enough due to inexact time, non- functioning stations and disappearance data. The application of Meteorological Satellite (METSAT) visible (VIS) images is the latest technique implement in rainfall estimation and flood forecasting that can contribute a wide area of information in forecasting rainfall depth based on cloud Albedo. This study focuses on the correlating between cloud Albedo and rainfall depth with comparing the rainfall data provided by Department of Irrigation and Drainage (DID) in order to estimate rainfall. From this study, the result obtained from correlation analysis is correlation is equal to 20.4% and a linear law-regression equation; y = 0.4239x + 4.18 for Klang River basin; that can be used to estimate rainfall based on cloud Albedo data from METSAT visible images. It can be summarize that high value of Albedo will contribute higher intensity of rainfall based on the analysis that has been carried out. Therefore, the rainfall estimation equation is still considered reliable in estimating the average rainfall depth for Klang River Basin despite the weak correlation. However, in certain rainfall events, the equations may underestimate the rainfall value due the formation of Albedo that appears only during daytime. Keywords: flood, flood forecasting, satellite, rainfall estimation. INTRODUCTION Malaysia is tropical country that situated in central South-East Asia with high humidity climate. It has an equatorial climate, where it does experience high amount of rainfall throughout the year. The annual mean rainfall is around 3000 mm. The climate in Malaysia is characterized by two monsoons namely Southwest Monsoon from late May to September, and the Northeast Monsoon from November to March. The Northeast Monsoon brings heavy rain especially to the states on the east coast of Peninsular Malaysia and western Sarawak, while the Southwest Monsoon normally signifies relatively drier weather. The northeast monsoon is characterized by persistent winds from the northeast. During this monsoon, the west coast states of Peninsular Malaysia usually having thunderstorms in most places in the afternoons and the evenings. Due to this climate condition, flooding is the most common natural disaster that occurs in Malaysia. According to Malaysia Meteorology Department (MMD), the occurrence of heavy and widespread rain during November and early December begins in Kelantan and Terengganu. Then, it follows by rain that moves slowly to Pahang and East Johor during December and early January as the monsoon start to progress. Rainfall can be categorized into three different intensities which are low, moderate and high intensity. The basic types of rainfall that cause flood are rainfall with moderate intensity and covering wide area long duration and rainfall with high intensity and short duration localized rainfall. Many studies have indicates the adverse effect cause by flooding to the economy, environment, health and human being [10-11]. Major effects of floods involved in destruction of life and property or infrastructure such as roads and bridges in urban areas. Besides that, flooding can cause spreading of disease and food poisoning that will cause mortality. Rainfall estimation and weather forecasting are closely related with flooding problems. Rainfall is one of the most difficult variables to forecast due to its large variability, space and in time [12]. Department of Irrigation and Drainage (DID) responsible to locate station for rainfall and water level daily and hourly monitoring. However, the rainfall and water level station need to be improved as the data obtained not accurate enough due to inexact time, non-functioning stations and disappearance data. Satellite data can provide information covering large areas as well as cloud properties for critical flooded area [3]. There are also many other studies that highlighted the advantages of satellite for rainfall measurement [4, 8, 12]. The satellite infrared images (IR) have been used by most of the researchers to generate the relationship between meteorological data with hydrological data for rainfall prediction. Besides, it has been stated that the analysis on infrared images (IR) are proven to provide better technique for rainfall estimation in order to control flood problems. Flood forecasting system is believes to be improves by this latest technology that combined the meteorological and hydrological field together. Therefore, the application of meteorological satellite (METSAT)