A high resolution climatology of precipitation and deep convection over the Mediterranean region from operational satellite microwave data: development and application to the evaluation of model uncertainties

Claud, Chantal; Alhammoud, Bahjat; Funatsu, Beatriz M.; Brossier, Cindy Lebeaupin; Chaboureau, Jean‐Pierre; Béranger, Karine; Drobinski, Philippe

doi:10.5194/nhess-12-785-2012

Cited by 24 publications

(26 citation statements)

References 48 publications

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“…• The downscaled ERA-interim reanalyses (1989)(1990)(1991)(1992)(1993)(1994)(1995)(1996)(1997)(1998)(1999)(2000)(2001)(2002)(2003)(2004)(2005)(2006)(2007)(2008) by WRF RCM is named CTL hereafter and has been evaluated in-depth over the land surrounding the Mediterranean Sea (Claud et al 2012;Flaounas et al 2013;Stéfanon et al 2014). The CTL simulations is forced by the ERA-interim SST at its lower boundary over the Mediterranean Sea.…”

Section: Simulationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

North-western Mediterranean sea-breeze circulation in a regional climate system model

et al. 2017

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regional climate model (AORCM) coupling WRF and NEMO-MED12 in the frame of HyMeX/MED-CORDEX are compared. One result of this study is that these simulations reproduce remarkably well the intensity, direction and inland penetration of the sea breeze and even the existence of the shallow sea breeze despite the overestimate of temperature over land in both simulations. The coupled simulation provides a more realistic representation of the evolution of the SST field at fine scale than the atmosphereonly one. Temperature and moisture anomalies are created in direct response to the SST anomaly and are advected by the sea breeze over land. However, the SST anomalies are not of sufficient magnitude to affect the large-scale seabreeze circulation. The temperature anomalies are quickly damped by strong surface heating over land, whereas the water vapor mixing ratio anomalies are transported further inland. The inland limit of significance is imposed by the vertical dilution in a deeper continental boundary-layer.

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Section: Simulationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

North-western Mediterranean sea-breeze circulation in a regional climate system model

et al. 2017

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“…Since this dataset has been described in details in a recent paper [17], we recall here only the most important points. This study mainly uses the AMSU-B sensor, which is a cross-scanning microwave instrument flying on board NOAA sun-synchronous polar-orbiting satellites since late 1998.…”

Section: Amsu-based Precipitation and Convection Occurrencementioning

confidence: 99%

“…In case of overlapping areas (which occur mostly in the northern part of the area), we interpolate the brightness temperatures of the different orbits. Table 1 summarizes the time intervals considered for each platform (NOAA 15,16,17).…”

Section: Amsu-based Precipitation and Convection Occurrencementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Some differences are still observed; for example, NOAA-16 shows slightly higher amplitude values of MR frequency along the studied period, while NOAA-17 exhibits slightly higher amplitude values of DC frequency from 2004 onward. This difference could be related to the sampling time [17]. Figure 4 shows the eight-year climatology of MR and DC observed by NOAA-15 over the Mediterranean region from January 2000 through December 2007.…”

Section: Interannual Variabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

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Patterns of Precipitation and Convection Occurrence over the Mediterranean Basin Derived from a Decade of Microwave Satellite Observations

et al. 2014

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Abstract:The Mediterranean region is characterized by its vulnerability to changes in the water cycle, with the impact of global warming on the water resources being one of the major concerns in social, economical and scientific ambits. Even if precipitation is the best-known term of the Mediterranean water budget, large uncertainties remain due to the lack of suitable offshore observational data. In this study, we use the data provided by the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit-B (AMSU-B) on board NOAA satellites to detect and analyze precipitating and convective events over the last decade at spatial resolution of 0.2° latitude × 0.2° longitude. AMSU-B observation shows that rain occurrence is widespread over the Mediterranean in wintertime while reduced in the eastern part of the basin in summer. Both precipitation and convection occurrences display a weak diurnal cycle over sea. In addition, convection occurrences, which are essentially located over land during summertime, shift to mostly over the sea during autumn with maxima in the Ionian sub-basin and the Adriatic Sea. Precipitation occurrence is also inferred over the sea from two other widely used climatological datasets, HOAPS (Hamburg Ocean Atmosphere OPEN ACCESSAtmosphere 2014, 5 371Parameters and Fluxes from Satellite Data) and the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) reanalysis interim (ERA-Interim). There is generally a rather fair agreement between these climatologies for describing the large-scale patterns such as the strong latitudinal gradient of rain and eastward rain signal propagation. Furthermore, the higher spatial resolution of AMSU-B measurements (16 km at nadir) gives access to mesoscale details in the region (e.g., coastal areas). AMSU-B measurements show less rain occurrences than HOAPS during wintertime, thereby suggesting that some of the thresholds used in our method might be too stringent during this season. We also observed that convection occurrences in ERA-Interim are systematically lower than those derived from AMSU-B. These results are potentially valuable to evaluate the rainfall parameterization in weather and climate models and to constrain ocean models.

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“…Some of these regions coincide with areas characterized as being vulnerable to heavy precipitation that induces floods over the MR (Harats et al, 2010). Claud et al (2012) and Alhammoud et al (2014) have extended the data set using measurements from the AMSU-B and the Microwave Humidity Sensor instruments onboard additional NOAA satellites. They found that interannual variability of deep convection is strongest along the northern coasts of the MB.…”

Section: Spatial Distribution Of Deep Convective Precipitation Over Tmentioning

confidence: 99%

Review Article: Atmospheric conditions inducing extreme precipitation over the eastern and western Mediterranean

Dayan

Nissen

Ulbrich

2015

Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci.

100

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Abstract. This review discusses published studies of heavy rainfall events over the Mediterranean Basin, combining them in a more general picture of the dynamic and thermodynamic factors and processes that produce heavy rain storms. It distinguishes the western and eastern Mediterranean in order to point out specific regional peculiarities. The crucial moisture for developing intensive convection over these regions can be originated not only from the adjacent Mediterranean Sea but also from distant upwind sources. Transport from remote sources is usually in the mid-tropospheric layers and associated with specific features and patterns of the larger-scale circulations. The synoptic systems (tropical and extratropical) that account for most of the major extreme precipitation events and the coupling of circulation and extreme rainfall patterns are presented. Heavy rainfall over the Mediterranean Basin is caused at times in concert by several atmospheric processes working at different atmospheric scales, such as local convection, upper synoptic-scale-level troughs, and mesoscale convective systems. Under tropical air-mass intrusions, convection generated by static instability seems to play a more important role than synoptic-scale vertical motions. Locally, the occurrence of torrential rains and their intensity is dependent on factors such as temperature profiles and implied instability, atmospheric moisture, and lower-level convergence.

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A high resolution climatology of precipitation and deep convection over the Mediterranean region from operational satellite microwave data: development and application to the evaluation of model uncertainties

Cited by 24 publications

References 48 publications

North-western Mediterranean sea-breeze circulation in a regional climate system model

North-western Mediterranean sea-breeze circulation in a regional climate system model

Patterns of Precipitation and Convection Occurrence over the Mediterranean Basin Derived from a Decade of Microwave Satellite Observations

Review Article: Atmospheric conditions inducing extreme precipitation over the eastern and western Mediterranean

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