2.

1 PRECIPITATION
 Precipitation –the total amount of water falling from the
atmosphere in the form of rain , snow , mist , etc. on the
earth.
 The phenomena from its formation to reaching to the
ground are counted under meteorology and the amount as it
reaches to the ground is tackled by hydrology.
Conditions for Occurrence of Precipitation
Moisture in the atmosphere
 Cooling of air mass
 Formation of clouds due to Condensation
Condensation is the process by which water vapor in the
atmosphere is converted in to droplets or , at low
temperatures , in to ice crystals.
 Growth of water droplets
 Forms of Precipitation

 Rain: when water reaches in the surface of the earth

in the form of droplets of water (0.5 to 6 mm)
 Snow: forms of ice crystal

 Drizzle: water droplets less than 0.5mm

 Sleet: where rain falls through air of sub freezing

temperature, ice formed.
 Hail: ice ranging from 5mm to 50mm

 Dew : water droplets formed on the surface of the

earth during night
 Weather Systems for Precipitation
 The transport of air masses takes place in several
ways,by;
 convection,
Orographic lifting,
lifting by fronts and
Cyclonic.
Convective ( Convectional precipitation)
 caused by the rising of warm, lighter air due to heating
of earth‘s surface.
 Occurs mostly in the tropics.
 Water vapor in the air condenses and finally preciptate.
Orographic Lifting
Orographic precipitation results when warm moist air get
lifted up to higher altitudes due to the presence of
mountain barriers.
 Frontal Lifting (Frontal precipitation)
precipitation
 Front is the interface b/n two distinct air masses.
 When a warm air mass and cold air mass meet , the
warmer air mass is lifted over the colder one with the
formation of a front. The ascending warmer air cools
adiabatically with the consequent formation of clouds and
precipitation
 Frontal precipitation is usually in drizzle form.
Mainly occurred in temperate zones.
 Cyclonic (Cyclonic precipitation)
 A cyclone is a large low pressure region with circular wind
motion.
 When a low pressure region (cyclone) is developed then air
from the surrounding region tends to move into the low
pressure region.
 In doing so the low pressure air is lifted up ward to cool
and precipitate.
Convective……
 Rainfall Measurement
 Rainfall is measured by an instrument called raingauges.
 A rain gauuge is an instrument that captures
precipitation and measures its accumulated volume
during a certain time period.
 If the precipitation is of snow type it is collected in
snow gauges melted and its water equivalent is recorded.
 The precipitation depth for the given period is equal to
the accumulated volume divided by the collecting area of
the gage.
 The depth of rain fall is expressed in mm,inches,cm,etc.
 Types of Rain Gauges
 Rain gauges are of two types:
Non-recording gauges
Recording gauges
 Non-recording gauges
• They donot record the data
• Collect rainfall
• Collected rainfall is measured later on by measuring
tube or stick
• Depth of rain=volum of rain collected cm3/area of
aperture of guages cm2
 Recording Rain gauges
 Give directly the rainfall reading
 Record continuously
 such gauges have a rotating drum with graph paper
fixed around it.
 There is also a pen in contact with the graph paper,
which moves up with the collected rain and thus
recording the cumulative rain, with the passage of
time.
Types of recording Rain gauges
 The three common Types of Recording gauges are:
• Tipping-bucket gauge
• Weighing-type gauge
• Floating type
 Rain Gauge Network Design
 A basin should have as many number of gages as possible
to give a clear representative picture of the areal
distribution of the precipitation.

 Pilot gauges be fixed over an area

 Statistical analysis can be carried out to check the
analysis

Where
N : number of stations;
Ep : the allowable percentage error in the estimation of
the mean annual rainfall;
Cv : the coefficient of variation of the rainfall from the
existing n stations in percentage.
 Rain Gage Network Design…
• The allowable percentage of error E p is normally taken as
10%.
• While computing the value of C v if the value comes less
than 10%, we can assume the existing stations to be
sufficient for the basin.
• In case N > n, the additional stations required for the basin
can be found as (N-n).
 Site where gauge should be located
• Open place and easily accessible
• The distance between the rain gage and the nearest object
should be at least twice the height of the object
• In the hills where it is difficult to find level space, the site
for the gage should be chosen where it is best shielded
from high winds and where the wind doesn’t cause eddies
• A fence, if erected to protect the gage from cattle, etc,
should be located that the distance of the fence is not less
than twice its height
Cont….
 Errors in measuring Rainfall data
 A number of errors can occur in the measurement of
rain fall with a rain gauge.
 These errors are due to:
 Airflow
 Unrepresentative orientation and exposure of the gauge

 Human observation and transmission

 Evaporation from with in the cylinder , gauge leaks and
overflow.
 Change in exposure area of the receiver due to bend
and dents in the rim
 Estimation of Areal rain fall
• Rain fall varies both temporally and spatially.
• The temporal rainfall distribution shows the variation of
rainfall depth within storm duration.
• This can be expressed in either discrete or continuous
form.
• The discrete form is referred to as a hyetograph i.e. a
histogram of rainfall depth (or rainfall intensity) with
time increments as abscissa and rainfall depth (or
rainfall intensity) as ordinates.
• The continuous form is a function describing the rate of
rainfall accumulation with time.
• Storm duration is the time elapsed from start to end of
the storm event.
 Estimation of Areal rain fall……
Rainfall hyetograph Rainfall Hyetograph

80 1000

Intensity (mm/hr)
60 800
600 Intensity
Depth (mm)

40 Rainfall
400
20 200
0 0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40
Duration (min) Duration (min)

Cummulative
Cummulative Depth

Mass Curve

500
400
(MM)

300
200
100
0
0 10 20 30 40 50
Duration (min)
 Estimation of Areal rain fall……
 The spatial variation of rainfall shows the same amount
of rainfall doesn’t fall uniformly over the entire
catchments .
 Isohyets are used to show the variation of rainfall.
spatial
 Isohyets are lines joining points of equal magnitude in a
map.
 During a given storm, it is likely that the depth measured
by two or more rain gauges of the same type will not be
the same.
 In hydrologic analysis, it is often necessary to determine
a spatial average of the rainfall depth over the
catchment.
 Estimation of Areal rain fall……

P1

P3 P5
P2 Average
Rainfall
P4
P6
 Arithmetic mean method

 It is computed as the arithmetic mean of the amounts

measured by the gauges within the area.
Pav = 1/n (P1 + P2 + . . . + Pn)
Pav = Average rainfall over the area
Pi = Rainfall at different gauges
n = Number of gauges in the area

 The method is used for:

• Flat areas
• When the stations are closely and uniformly distributed
over the area
 Theissen Polygons method
• The method assumes that the recorded rainfall in a
gauge is representative for the area half-way to the
adjacent gauges.
Step 1: Draw the area
Thiessen Method : Steps concerned to a suitable
scale, showing its boundary,
P1
P2 locations of the raingauges
P4
in the area and outside but
P5
P3 close to the boundary
P6
P7

Step 2: Join location of

the raingauges to form
a network of triangles
 P1
P2
Step 3: Draw perpendicular
P4 P5
bisectors to the triangle sides.
P3 These bisectors form polygons
around the stations
P6
P7

P1
A1
A2 P2
A4
A3 P4 P5
A5
P3
A6
P6 A7
P7
 Theissen Polygons method….
 This method gives good results when the rain gauges
are not evenly distributed over the area in both flat
and hilly terrain.
P1
• Thiessen Method : Example A1
A2 P2

A4

A3 P4 P5
A5
P3

A6
P6 A7

P7
 Isohyetal method
0
 Isohyet is a line 0

10
0 0 0
joining points of equal 0
rainfall magnitude 1 4 16 11
11
• Most accurate method Isohyetes 10
19
11

62
45
9
45 27 10
•Incorporates the orographic • All figures are in mm

25
1
25 0
effect 65 50

50
Monthly isohyetal map (sample )
Isohyetal Method: Steps
 Steps.....

Step 3: Determine the area between each pair of the

isohyet lines, either by a planimeter or by converting the
areas into smaller regular geometric shapes.

Step 4: Calculate the average rainfall using the following formula:

A1 (P1 + P2)/2 + A2 (P2 + P3)/2 + . . . + An-1(Pn-1 + Pn)/2
Pav =
(A1 + A2 + . . . + An)
Pi = Value of Isohyet lines
Ai = Area between pair of isohyet lines.
Isohyetal Method: Example

Calculate the average rainfall over the area given in the

figure using Isohyetal method.
 Rain fall data interpretation
 After acquiring a set of point precipitation
data, it is necessary to first verify the data
before using it for analysis or design. The
data set should be checked for missing
and consistency of data.
 If there are missing data, they should be
replaced if possible.
 If there are inconsistent data, they should
be adjusted
 Filling in missing records
 Incomplete records of rainfall are sometimes possible
due to operator error or equipment malfunction.
Arithmetic Average Method
Px = 1/n (P1 + P2 + ... +Pn)
Px = missing rainfall data at station x
Pi = rainfall data at the neighbouring station i
n = number of neighbouring raingauges
Compute % differences
Diff. =|Ni-Nx|/Nx x 100

NO
IsIs Diff.<
Diff < 10%
10%? Normal Ratio

YES

Arithmetic Average
Example : Estimation of Missing Rainfall Data, Stations from
Ethiopia
Station Name Monthly data, Normal annual Rainfall % Difference
July, 1980 (mm) (mm)

Hawzien 195.7 446 5.5

Ilala 186.5 452 4.2

Adigrat 243.3 512 8.5

Quiha ? 472 _

% Diff < 10 Arithmetic Average

Px = 1/3 (195.7 + 186.5 + 243.3)
Px = 208.5mm
Example : Estimation of Missing Rainfall Data, Data from India
Station Id. Rainfall at one Normal %
Storm event(mm) annual Difference
Rainfall
1 107 1120 14.5

2 89 935 4.4

3 122 1200 22.7

4 ? 978 -

% Difference > 10 Normal Ratio method

Px = 1/3 (978/1120 x 107 + 978/935 x 89 + 978/1200 x 122)
Px = 95.3mm
 Consistency of rainfall data
• Numerous factors could affect the consistency of the
record at a given station.
– damage and replacement of a rain gauge
– change in the gauge location or elevation
– human, mechanical, or electrical error in taking readings
 A method called ”double mass curve analysis” is used
for adjusting inconsistent data.
 comparing the accumulated annual (or seasonal,
monthly, weekly, daily, or hourly) precipitation at the
station in question with the accumulated annual (or
seasonal, monthly, weekly, daily, or hourly)
precipitation for a group of surrounding stations.
 Consistency of rainfall data….

m2

m1

 A break in the double mass curve in the figure

indicates that a change occurred in that year.
 If the slope of the line prior to the change is m1 , and
that after the change is m2 then the adjustment factor
is , which is m1/m2 , the multiplier applied to the post-
change observed data to obtain the adjusted data.
 Double Mass Curve

30000

25000
Cumulative of X after correction

20000

15000

10000

5000

0
0 5000 10000 15000 20000 25000 30000
Cummulative of Surrounding Stations