Rainfall nowcasting by combining radars, microwave links and rain gauges

TL;DR

This paper presents a novel variational data assimilation method combining radar, microwave links, and rain gauges to produce high-resolution, short-term rain nowcasts with quantified uncertainties, improving urban flood prediction.

Contribution

It introduces a Variational Kalman Filter approach that integrates multiple rain sensors and accounts for their uncertainties to enhance short-term rainfall forecasts.

Findings

Valid up to 20-minute lead times for stratiform events.

Less effective for convective events with shorter lead times.

Demonstrated improved rain rate estimation in Zurich area.

Abstract

The objective of this work is to provide high-resolution rain rate maps at short lead-time forecasts (nowcasts) necessary to anticipate flooding and properly manage sewage systems in urban areas by combining radars, rain gauges, and operational microwave links, and taking into account their respective uncertainties. A variational approach (3D-Var) is used to find the best estimate for the rain rate, and its error covariance, from the different rain sensors. Short-term rain rate forecasts are then produced by assuming Lagrangian persistence. A velocity field is obtained from the operational radar-derived rain fields, and the rain rate field is advected using the Total Variance Diminishing (TVD) scheme. The error covariance associated to the estimated rain rate is also propagated, and we use these two in the 3D-Var at the next observation time step. This approach can be seen as a Variational Kalman Filter (VKF), in which the covariance of the prior is not constant but dependent on time. The proposed approach has been tested using data from 14 rain gauges, 14 microwave links and the operational radar rain product from MeteoSwiss in the area of Zurich (Switzerland). During the applications the assumption of the Lagrangian persistence appears to be valid up to 20 min (a bit longer for stratiform events). During convective events, the algorithm is less powerful and shorter lead times should be considered (i.e., 15 min). Although such lead times are short, they are still useful to various hydrological and outdoor applications.