Long-Term High-Resolution Gauge Adjusted Satellite Rainfall Product over India

Abstract

This study aims to create a 21-year, high spatiotemporal resolution Global Satellite Mapping of Precipitation (GSMaP) rainfall product adjusted by rain gauge measurements over the Indian mainland. The targeted resolutions of the GSMaP are hourly and 0.1°× 0.1°. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Climate Prediction Center (CPC) daily gauge analysis (0.5°× 0.5°) and Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) daily gridded rainfall product (0.25°× 0.25°) were utilized to generate two long-term rainfall products, GSMaP CPC and GSMaP IMD rainfall, respectively. After preliminary verification of the GSMaP CPC and GSMaP IMD rainfalls with IMD gauges, these rainfall products are evaluated for the Indian Summer Monsoon (ISM) periods of 2000-2020 with comparisons of other merged rainfall products such as the Integrated Multi-satellitE Retrievals for Global Precipitation Measurement (IMERG). The results suggest GSMaP IMD has a smaller root-mean-square difference (RMSD) and higher correlation than GSMaP CPC, evaluated against independent rainfall products. In the threehour mean analysis with spaceborne precipitation radar data, it is found that the value of RMSD decreases in GSMaP IMD with respect to GSMaP CPC throughout the day. The statistics against the hourly dense rain gauge network in Karnataka suggests that the GSMaP IMD is more effective in capturing large spatiotemporal rainfall variation over India. Thus, validation results with the independent sources suggest that GSMaP IMD rainfall generally improved over GSMaP CPC rainfall. These improvements are significant in orographic regions with high rainfall amounts, mainly the western Ghats and northeastern parts of India.