RTTOV v14 Code Updates
Updates and bug fixes to RTTOV v14 are published here. There are separate pages for RTTOV v13 bug fixes, RTTOV v12 bug fixes and RTTOV v11 bug fixes.
Known bugs and issues
Please report any bugs you find in RTTOV using the NWP SAF Helpdesk. The official release packages for each version don’t contain the bug fixes or updates listed here under that version so you should apply any fixes provided below. Bugs/updates in earlier versions have been fixed/implemented in later versions.
Date Type/Status Description
18/08/2025 Minor bug - fixed Affects: NLTE-enabled rtcoef files converted to ASCII format using RTTOV v14 which are then read using RTTOV v13 (v14.0 with v13.x)
Issue: a run-time failure occurs in RTTOV v13 when reading an NLTE-enabled rtcoef file that was converted to ASCII format (e.g., from netCDF) using RTTOV v14.
Fix: one solution is to carry out conversions only using RTTOV v13 (e.g. convert a corresponding HDF5 format file directly).
Alternatively, download this file to the RTTOV v14 src/coef_io/ directory, and recompile RTTOV (a clean compilation is not necessary). This will ensure that ASCII files converted using RTTOV v14 are compatible with v13.
29/07/2025 Minor bug - fixed Affects: solar scattering simulations with an rtcoef file containing only VIS/NIR channels.
Issue: code will segfault if delta-Eddington is selected as the thermal_solver because it expects the asymmetry parameter to be present in the aertable/hydrotable, but the asymmetry parameter is not computed/stored in the optical property files in this case.
Fix: a simple mitigation is to set the thermal_solver to DOM. This has no impact on the simulations.
For a code fix, download this file to the src/main/ directory, and recompile RTTOV (a clean compilation is not necessary).
27/02/2025 Minor bug - fixed Affects: solar simulations when passing multiple profiles into RTTOV and one or more (but not all) profile solar zenith angles exceed the maximum allowed value (85.3 degrees) (RTTOV v14.0).
Issue: it is possible that some radiance outputs (it has only been observed in overcast radiances so far) contain spurious values for VIS/NIR channels corresponding to the profiles with solar zenith angles larger than the maximum. All outputs should be zero for such channels.
Fix: download and extract this tarball to the src/main/ directory, and recompile RTTOV (a clean compilation is not necessary).