An operational, single-polarized X-band weather radar (WRX) provides measurements in Hamburg’s city center since 2013. This local area weather radar (LAWR) is located on the rooftop of the high-rise building "Geomatikum" in Hamburg (HHG), which is the location of the Meteorological Institute of the Universität Hamburg. The radar operates at one beam elevation angle with a high temporal 30 s, range 60 m, and sampling 1° resolution refining observations of the German nationwide C-band radars within a 20 km scan radius. Several sources of radar-based errors were adjusted gradually improving the measurement variables, e.g. the radar calibration, alignment, attenuation, noise, non-meteorologial echoes. This experiment includes data sets of the equivalent radar reflectivity factor (dbz) in level 1 (without attenuation correction) and the rainfall rate (rr) in level 2 (applied attenuation correction). The WRX/LAWR HHG measurements were calibrated and evaluated with measurements of micro rain radars (MRR). With this high-quality and -resolution weather radar product, refined studies on the spatial and temporal scale of urban precipitation will be possible. For example, the data sets will be used for further hydrological research in an urban area within the project Sustainable Adaption Scenarios for Urban Areas – Water from Four Sides of the Cluster of Excellence Climate Climatic Change, and Society (CliCCS). This work was partly funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) under Germany‘s Excellence Strategy – EXC 2037 'CLICCS - Climate, Climatic Change, and Society' – Project Number: 390683824, contribution to the Center for Earth System Research and Sustainability (CEN) of Universität Hamburg. Changes in Version 2: - We provide daily instead of hourly files to reduce the number of files for better data handling. For the days 23.09.2014, 12.03.2015, 09.06.2015, 05.07.2017, and 01.02.2018 there are two files to avoid additional time dependencies of variables because of changes in calibration or alignment parameters. - We changed the data type (double to int64) and the unit days since 1970-01-01 to seconds since 1970-01-01 of the time coordinate. - We changed the standard names / long names of the variables azimuth, range and ele. - We added the integer variable grid_mapping with the attributes grid_mapping_name ("radar_lidar_radial_scan"), latitude_of_projection_origin, longitude_of_projection_origin and height_of_projection_origin, as suggested by the CfRadial conventions. Since the grid_mapping variable provides the same information as the variables lat_center, lon_center and zsl_center, we removed them. We added the attribute grid_mapping to the variable rr and dbz.
Burgemeister, Finn; Clemens, Marco; Ament, Felix (2024). Multi-year X-band weather radar observations in Hamburg (LAWR HHG) (Version 2). World Data Center for Climate (WDCC) at DKRZ. https://doi.org/10.26050/WDCC/LAWR_UHH_HHG_v2
Level 2a approved by the authors (04.05.2022): For example, we compared the LAWR HHG measurement variables with observations of micro rain radars. The...
Description
Level 2a approved by the authors (04.05.2022): For example, we compared the LAWR HHG measurement variables with observations of micro rain radars. The rainfall rates and radar reflectivites of both measurement devices are in good agreement. Additionally, we checked spatial patterns of several single measurements of both variables and the the monthly rainfall sums derived from the level 2 rainfall rates for continuity.
Completeness report
Some measurement times are missing (not included within the data sets) due to maintenance and technical errors. The data availability of the years is:...
Description
Some measurement times are missing (not included within the data sets) due to maintenance and technical errors. The data availability of the years is: 2013 = 57 %, 2014 = 75 %, 2015 = 97 %, 2016 = 98 %, 2017 = 93 %, 2018 = 96 %, 2019 = 98 %, 2020 = 79 %, 2021 = 61 %. In all data files of the same data set groups the parameters are the same.
FAIR
F-UJI result: total 66 %
Description
Summary: Findable: 6 of 7 level; Accessible: 2 of 3 level; Interoperable: 3 of 4 level; Reusable: 5 of 10 level
SQA - Scientific Quality Assurance 'approved by author'
Result Date
2024-01-16
Technical Quality Assurance (TQA)
TQA - Technical Quality Assurance 'approved by WDCC'
Description
1. Number of data sets is correct and > 0: passed; 2. Size of every data set is > 0: passed; 3. The data sets and corresponding metadata are accessible: passed; 4. The data sizes are controlled and correct: passed; 5. The spatial-temporal coverage description (metadata) is consistent to the data, time steps are correct and the time coordinate is continuous: passed; 6. The format is correct: passed; 7. Variable description and data are consistent: passed
Method
WDCC-TQA checklist
Method Description
Checks performed by WDCC. The list of TQA metrics are documented in the 'WDCC User Guide for Data Publication' Chapter 8.1.1