Article ID | Journal | Published Year | Pages | File Type |
---|---|---|---|---|
8864816 | Atmospheric Research | 2018 | 12 Pages |
Abstract
Severe weather regularly hits the Lleida Plain (western part of Catalonia, NE of Iberian Peninsula), causing important damage to the local agriculture. In order to help severe weather surveillance tasks, the Meteorological Service of Catalonia (SMC) implemented in 2016 the Lightning Jump (LJ) algorithm as operative warning tool after an exhaustive validation phase of several months. The present study delves into the analysis of the relationship between Lightning Jump alerts and hail occurrence, through the analysis of lightning and radar variables in the moment when the warning is issued. Overall, the study has consisted of the analysis of 149 cases, grouping them into two categories according to hail size: small and large hail, with a threshold of 2Â cm of diameter. The thunderstorms related to big sized hail presented remarkable differences in some of the variables analysed that could help forecast the size of hail when the LJ alert is triggered. Moreover, other variables have been allowed to observe and to corroborate how the LJ algorithm works during the 13Â min before the warning is triggered.
Keywords
Related Topics
Physical Sciences and Engineering
Earth and Planetary Sciences
Atmospheric Science
Authors
C. Farnell, T. Rigo, N. Pineda,