Software Package for Gauge-Only Precipitation Analysis

The purpose of gauge analysis package is to encourage the hydrology community to exchange their advanced algorithms and applications with baseline codes so that further development and management for long-term hydro-climate product are facilitated. In addition, flexible use of the package will help tackle outstanding scientific issues in gauge analysis such as i) treatment of anisotropy, ii) disaggregation of daily rainfall for hourly analysis, iii) optimal merging with remotely sensed data.

The gauge-only analysis (called gmosaic) is one of the gridded hourly quantitative precipitation estimates (QPE) generated by NWS River Forecast Centers (RFCs). The National Climatic Data Center (NCDC), in collaboration with Office of Hydrologic Development (OHD), streamlined the operational version of the “gauge_only” module of the operational Multi-sensor Precipitation Estimator (MPE) to adapt it for retrospective long-term hydro-climatic applications, including use in production of the forthcoming blended radar-gauge Multisensor Precipitation Reanalysis (MPR). Some modifications from operational version of the gauge-only analysis are;

(1) Separate interface for in situ data to allow inclusion of users' own gauge data,

(2) Separate multiple gauges to handle sub-pixel gauge data,

(2) Off-line gauge quality control routines for sensitivity testing,

(3) User-provided analysis domain (default is CONUS) and parameters,

(4) Diagnostic outputs for investigations of timing and missing values.

The user's manual includes instructions for accessing source codes and sample hourly precipitation data.