Rainfall variability from a dense rain gauge network in north-western Italy

CR Climate Research Contact the journal Facebook Twitter RSS Mailing List Subscribe to our mailing list via Mailchimp HomeLatest VolumeAbout the JournalEditorsSpecials CR 75:201-213 (2018) - DOI: https://doi.org/10.3354/cr01517 Rainfall variability from a dense rain gauge network in north-western Italy A. Baronetti1,*, F. Acquaotta1,2, S. Fratianni1,2 1Department Earth Sciences, and 2Centro Interdipartimentale sui Rischi Naturali in Ambiente Montano e Collinare, University of Turin, 10125 Turin, Italy *Corresponding author: albarone@unito.it ABSTRACT: The aim of this study was to investigate the spatial and temporal distribution of rainfall in Piedmont, a region in north-western Italy, in order to evaluate the high intensity precipitation events that occurred in the 2004-2016 period. A daily precipitation series of 211 ground stations, belonging to 2 different meteorological monitoring networks, were analysed. As at first step, a quality control was performed on the daily precipitation series to evaluate the homogeneity of the series. The annual rainfall events were spatialised, using the ordinary kriging method, considering the whole set of weather stations. Moreover, 5 climatic areas were identified through a cluster analysis method. In order to better understand the extreme rainfall events, the main climatic precipitation indices were calculated, using ClimPACT2 software, and the thresholds by percentile were calculated for each cluster on a daily scale to identify the different precipitation types (weak, medium, heavy, very heavy [R95p]). Non-parametric (Kolmogorov-Smirnov and Wilcoxon) and parametric (Student's t-test) tests were applied to the annual and seasonal number of events observed for each rainfall class in order to study the statistical relationship between the clusters. The results lead to the conclusion that the investigated area is characterised by an increase in precipitation. Considering the extreme events, this methodology shows that even though the north sector is the wettest, central Piedmont is the area in which the highest number of extreme events was recorded. KEY WORDS: Piedmont · Rainfall · Extreme events · Kriging · Cluster analysis Full text in pdf format PreviousNextCite this article as: Baronetti A, Acquaotta F, Fratianni S (2018) Rainfall variability from a dense rain gauge network in north-western Italy. Clim Res 75:201-213. https://doi.org/10.3354/cr01517 Export citation RSS - Facebook - Tweet - linkedIn Cited by Published in CR Vol. 75, No. 3. Online publication date: August 09, 2018 Print ISSN: 0936-577X; Online ISSN: 1616-1572 Copyright © 2018 Inter-Research.