Identification

Title

Global precipitation and thunderstorm frequencies. Part I: Seasonal and interannual variations

Abstract

Present and past weather reports from ~15000 stations around the globe and from the Comprehensive Ocean-Atmosphere Data Set from 1975 to 1997 were analyzed for the frequency of occurrence for and the percentage of the days with various types of precipitation (drizzle, nondrizzle, showery, nonshowery, and snow) and thunderstorms. In this paper, the mean geographical, seasonal, and interannual variations in the frequencies are documented. Drizzles occur most frequently (5%-15% of the time) over mid- and high-latitude oceans. Nonshowery precipitation is the preferred form of precipitation over the storm-track regions at northern mid- and high latitudes in boreal winter and over the Antarctic Circumpolar Current in all seasons. Showery precipitation occurs ~5%-20% of the time over the oceans, as compared with < 10% over land areas except in boreal summer over Northern Hemisphere land areas, where showery precipitation and thunderstorms occur in over 20% of the days. Inferred mean precipitation intensity is generally < 1.0 mm h⁻¹ at mid- and high latitudes and 1.5-3.0 mm h⁻¹ in the Tropics. The intertropical convergence zone and the South Pacific convergence zone are clearly defined in the frequency maps but not in the intensity maps. Nonshowery precipitation at low latitudes is associated with showery precipitation, consistent with observations of stratiform precipitation accompanying mesoscale convective systems in the Tropics. The seasonal cycles of the showery precipitation and thunderstorm frequencies exhibit a coherent land-ocean pattern in that land areas peak in summer and the oceans peak in winter. The leading EOFs in the nondrizzle and nonshowery precipitation frequencies are an ENSO-related mode that confirms the ENSO-induced precipitation anomalies over the open oceans previously derived from satellite estimates.

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document

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https://n2t.org/ark:/85065/d7gx4bqv

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Dataset language

eng

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geoscientificInformation

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publication

effective date

2016-01-01T00:00:00Z

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publication

effective date

2001-03-01T00:00:00Z

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Copyright 2001 American Meteorological Society (AMS). Permission to use figures, tables, and brief excerpts from this work in scientific and educational works is hereby granted provided that the source is acknowledged. Any use of material in this work that is determined to be "fair use" under Section 107 or that satisfies the conditions specified in Section 108 of the U.S. Copyright Law (17 USC, as revised by P.L. 94-553) does not require the Society's permission. Republication, systematic reproduction, posting in electronic form on servers, or other uses of this material, except as exempted by the above statements, requires written permission or license from the AMS. Additional details are provided in the AMS Copyright Policies, available from the AMS at 617-227-2425 or amspubs@ametsoc.org. Permission to place a copy of this work on this server has been provided by the AMS. The AMS does not guarantee that the copy provided here is an accurate copy of the published work.

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Responsible organisations

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contact position

OpenSky Support

organisation name

UCAR/NCAR - Library

full postal address

PO Box 3000

Boulder

80307-3000

email address

opensky@ucar.edu

web address

http://opensky.ucar.edu/

name: homepage

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pointOfContact

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