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| Titel |
Analysis of warm season thunderstorms using an object-oriented tracking method based on radar and total lightning data |
| VerfasserIn |
T. Rigo, N. Pineda, J. Bech |
| Medientyp |
Artikel
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| Sprache |
Englisch
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| ISSN |
1561-8633
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| Digitales Dokument |
URL |
| Erschienen |
In: Natural Hazards and Earth System Science ; 10, no. 9 ; Nr. 10, no. 9 (2010-09-08), S.1881-1893 |
| Datensatznummer |
250008400
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| Publikation (Nr.) |
 copernicus.org/nhess-10-1881-2010.pdf |
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| Zusammenfassung |
Monitoring thunderstorms activity is an essential part of
operational weather surveillance given their potential hazards,
including lightning, hail, heavy rainfall, strong winds or even
tornadoes. This study has two main objectives: firstly, the
description of a methodology, based on radar and total lightning
data to characterise thunderstorms in real-time; secondly, the
application of this methodology to 66 thunderstorms that affected
Catalonia (NE Spain) in the summer of 2006. An object-oriented
tracking procedure is employed, where different observation data
types generate four different types of objects (radar 1-km CAPPI
reflectivity composites, radar reflectivity volumetric data,
cloud-to-ground lightning data and intra-cloud lightning data). In
the framework proposed, these objects are the building blocks of a
higher level object, the thunderstorm.
The methodology is demonstrated with a dataset of thunderstorms
whose main characteristics, along the complete life cycle of the
convective structures (development, maturity and dissipation), are
described statistically. The development and dissipation stages
present similar durations in most cases examined. On the contrary,
the duration of the maturity phase is much more variable and related
to the thunderstorm intensity, defined here in terms of lightning
flash rate. Most of the activity of IC and CG flashes is registered
in the maturity stage. In the development stage little CG flashes
are observed (2% to 5%), while for the dissipation phase is
possible to observe a few more CG flashes (10% to 15%).
Additionally, a selection of thunderstorms is used to examine
general life cycle patterns, obtained from the analysis of
normalized (with respect to thunderstorm total duration and maximum
value of variables considered) thunderstorm parameters. Among other
findings, the study indicates that the normalized duration of the
three stages of thunderstorm life cycle is similar in most
thunderstorms, with the longest duration corresponding to the
maturity stage (approximately 80% of the total time). |
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