Climatology of precipitation and clouds over Ethiopia
Ethiopia


General info
Precipitation
System properties
Cloud
Seasonal variation
Diurnal variation
Vertical Structure
Extreme events
Time series
  • Mean properties of precipitation system

  • During 1998-2013, total 162168 snapshots of precipitation features with size > 80 km^2 have been collected over Ethiopia , where 10107 of them have lightning flashes inside. Some mean properties of these features are listed below:
    samples (#) mean size (km^2) mean volumetric rain (mm/hr*km^2) mean echo top (km) mean 30 dBZ ehco top (km)mean flash count (#)
    All 162168 337 1231 6.5 2.3 0.47
    DJF 15260 185 585 6.3 1.8 0.13
    MAM 41087 319 1106 6.6 2.3 0.44
    JJA 62460 415 1551 6.5 2.2 0.63
    SON 43361 296 1118 6.5 2.4 0.37

  • Extreme rainy events
  • In all 162168 precipitation features, top 1% ( volumetric rain > 23103 mm/hr*km^2) rainy features contribute 45 % of total rainfall. Top 100 rainiest events observed by TRMM during 1998-2013 over Ethiopia are listed here . Following figure shows the location of the precipitation feautres categorized by the volumetric rainfall.


  • Extreme intense events
  • Some of the precipitation sytems are much intense with large hails and many lightning than others (see the lists of top lightning storms. Following figure shows the location of the precipitation feautres categorized by the lightning rate and 30 dBZ echo top.


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