Open AccessTracking, analysis, and nowcasting of C uban convective cells as seen by radar
Author(s) -
Novo S.,
Martínez D.,
Puentes O.
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
meteorological applications
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.672
H-Index - 59
eISSN - 1469-8080
pISSN - 1350-4827
DOI - 10.1002/met.1380
Subject(s) - nowcasting , radar , convective storm detection , trajectory , storm , meteorology , tracking (education) , convection , environmental science , remote sensing , climatology , computer science , geography , geology , physics , telecommunications , psychology , pedagogy , astronomy
This work describes the implementation and validation of an objective methodology for storm cell identification and tracking, which only uses radar reflectivity data as input. This methodology was applied to the statistical characterization of C uban convective storms. The properties of radar echoes during 13 convective days in the vicinity of C amaguey, C uba for the 2007 rainy season are obtained, and frequency distributions of mean hour of occurrence, total duration, maximum reflectivity, area, top height, and mean velocity during each trajectory are presented and compared to similar reports in C uba and other regions. The trajectory of each storm is extrapolated to forecast its position up to 1 h ahead. Both tracking and nowcasting are evaluated for different situations, showing the good performance of the method. Copyright © 2013 Royal Meteorological Society