Using Satellite and Lightning Data to Track Rapidly Developing Thunderstorms in Data Sparse Regions
Using Satellite and Lightning Data to Track Rapidly Developing Thunderstorms in Data Sparse Regions
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使用卫星和闪电数据跟踪数据稀疏地区快速发展的雷暴
DOI：
10.3390/atmos8040067
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发表时间：
2017
影响因子：
3.4
通讯作者：
E. Coning
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
M. Gijben;E. Coning
雷达系统提供有关强雷暴的强度、运动和特征的最有用的信息，但维护费用昂贵，需要大量的维护。在南非，有些地区没有雷达系统覆盖，而在其他南部非洲国家，很少有可用的雷达系统。尽管有这些缺点，所有的气象中心仍然必须警告公众即将发生的恶劣天气事件。欧洲的临近预报卫星应用设施（NWC SAF）开发了利用卫星数据识别和跟踪快速发展的雷暴（RDT）的软件。NWC软件于2014年安装在南非气象局。最初，我们用闪电资料验证了RDT产品，结果显示RDT产品可以提供有关可能出现的强对流风暴的非常有用的资料。本研究的重点是将闪电作为辅助数据集纳入算法的影响，然后根据雷达数据验证RDT产品。考虑了25个夏季案例，以确定与雷达数据相比，纳入闪电数据是否对RDT产品的准确性有积极影响。本研究结果表明，在大多数情况下，闪电数据的纳入有利于RDT产品。平均而言，检测概率（POD）提高了6.6%，海德克技能得分（HSS）提高了4.6%，误报率（FAR）提高了0.1%。据我们所知，南非是唯一正在运行NWC SAF软件的非洲国家，并根据雷达系统和闪电传感器的观测结果对该产品在非洲进行了评估。这项研究的结果对于经常发生对流和强对流并且缺乏复杂数据来源的非洲其他国家来说非常令人鼓舞。对东非的初步研究表明，RDT产品可用于强对流事件的近预报。
Radar systems provide the most useful information about the intensity, movement, and characteristics of severe thunderstorms, but are expensive to maintain and require extensive maintenance. In South Africa, some areas are not covered by radar systems, while very few operational radar systems exist in other southern African countries. Despite these shortcomings, all meteorological centers still have to warn the public of pending severe weather events. The Nowcasting Satellite Application Facility (NWC SAF) in Europe developed software that utilizes satellite data to identify and track rapidly developing thunderstorms (RDT). The NWC software was installed at the South African Weather Service in 2014. Initially, the RDT product was validated against lightning data and the results showed that the RDT product could provide very useful information on possible severe or intense convective storms. This study focusses on the effects of including lightning as an ancillary dataset into the algorithms and then validating the RDT product against radar data. Twenty-five summer cases were considered to determine whether the inclusion of lightning data had a positive effect on the accuracy of the RDT product, when compared to radar data. The results of this study show that in the majority of the cases, the inclusion of lightning data was beneficial to the RDT product. On average the Probability of Detection (POD) improved by 6.6%, the Heidke Skill Score (HSS) by 4.6%, and the False alarm ratio (FAR) by 0.1%. To our knowledge, South Africa is the only African country which is running the NWC SAF software operationally and which has performed an evaluation of the product over Africa against observations from radar systems and lightning sensors. The outcomes of this study are very encouraging for other countries in Africa where convection and severe convection often occur and sophisticated data sources are absent. Initial studies over East Africa indicate that the RDT product can benefit operational practices for the nowcasting of severe convection events.