Webcast

Use of the H-SAF precipitation products for the characterization and monitoring of heavy precipitation events in the Mediterranean area

The Mediterranean region is often impacted by heavy precipitation events, that are responsible for damages and sometimes casualties, especially over the coastal areas. Because of its peculiar geographical characteristics, conventional ground-based instruments, such as raingauge and radar networks, cannot be fully exploited for the monitoring, characterization and forecasting of severe events, in particular during their offshore development. For these reasons in the last decades satellite observations, both over geostationary and Leo platforms, have been recognized as a powerful tool to overcome the limitations of ground-based observations

In this presentation we analyze severe events that have recently affected the Mediterranean area, causing damages at the ground, and have challenged observational and forecasting capabilities. Heavy precipitation systems are described and analyzed here by exploiting active and passive microwave measurements and state-of-the-art precipitation products available in the HSAF project during the Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) mission era. We highlight how the HSAF satellite products specifically developed for the European area, and thus tailored for the Mediterranean region, show better performances than algorithms designed for global application. We also show few strategies to blend satellite data and products with conventional meteorological data, with the aim to increase the knowledge of severe systems in the Mediterranean area and to support operational forecasting activities in a climate change perspective.

 Lecture slides...