Factors governing the total rainfall yield from continental convective clouds

D. Rosenfeld, A. Gagin

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

8 Scopus citations

Abstract

Several important factors were investigated by tracking thousands of convective cells in Israel and South Africa. The rainfall volume yield (Rvol) of the individual cells that build convective rain systems has been shown to depend mainly on the cloud-top height. The following factors that influence the Rvol were parameterized and quantitatively analyzed: 1) cloud base temperature - it is shown that when other factors are fixed, a 50% increase in the absolute humidity of the cloud base will nearly double the Rvol. 2) Atmospheric instability - cells in a more unstable atmosphere will rain much less (up to a factor of 5) than cells which are forced to grow to a similar maximum height in a more stable atmosphere. 3) The extent of isolation of the cell - it is shown that isolated cells precipitate only about one-third of the Rvol of highly clustered cells, having the other factors be identical. -from Authors

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)1015-1030
Number of pages16
JournalJournal of Applied Meteorology
Volume28
Issue number10
DOIs
StatePublished - 1989

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