Output consistency analysis of the polarimetric weather radar simulator through real weather events

Abstract

POWERS is a polarimetric weather radar signal simulator developed by the RaSS (Radar and Surveillance System) Laboratory. This software allows to produce realistic weather radar measurements from a known meteorological scenario, generated by the WRF (Weather Research and Forecast) model. One of the problems encountered when developing complex simulators like POWERS, is to identify a number of methods through which one can assess their ability to generate realistic signals. In previous works we identified some of them. Here we discuss the general issue of the consistency of the simulator's outputs with respect to the original atmospheric scenario. Such analysis is based on a couple of real weather events: the first occurred in August 2015 in the Florence area and the second one in October 2012 over the Strait of Sicily. The analysis involves the precipitating liquid water provided by WRF and the reflectivity outputs gathered by POWERS when operating in the meteorological scenario defined by WRF itself. The objective of the analysis is to define the physical consistency between such scenario and the POWERS' reflectivity outputs by evaluating the errors made to retrieve the water content through the radar observables in both ideal and non-ideal conditions, and correlating the error spread to the variability of the microphysical parameters in the WRF scene.