ADGEO Advances in Geosciences ADGEO Adv. Geosci. 1680-7359 Copernicus Publications Göttingen, Germany 10.5194/adgeo-26-7-2010 Sensitivity of precipitation forecasts to convective parameterization in the October 2007 Flash Flood in the Valencia Region (Eastern Spain) Gómez I. 1 Pastor F. 1 Estrela M. 2 Laboratorio de Meteorología-Climatología, Unidad Mixta CEAM-UVEG, Fundación Centro de Estudios Ambientales del Mediterráneo, Programa de Meteorología y Climatología, Paterna (Valencia), Spain Laboratorio de Meteorología-Climatología, Unidad Mixta CEAM-UVEG, Departament de Geografia Física, Universitat de València, Valencia, Spain 30 06 2010 26 7 11 Copyright: © 2010 I. Gómez et al. 2010 This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this licence, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ This article is available from https://adgeo.copernicus.org/articles/26/7/2010/adgeo-26-7-2010.html The full text article is available as a PDF file from https://adgeo.copernicus.org/articles/26/7/2010/adgeo-26-7-2010.pdf

The Valencia region, on the Mediterranean coast of the Iberian Peninsula, is an area prone to torrential rains, especially the north of Alicante province and the south of Valencia province. In October 2007, a torrential rain event with accumulated rainfall values exceeding 400 mm in less than 24 h affected the aforementioned areas, producing flash floods that caused extensive economic losses and human casualties. Several simulations of this rain event have been performed with the Regional Atmospheric Modeling System (RAMS) to test the influence of the different convective parameterization scheme implemented in the model on the precipitation forecast.

 References % vor jede Referenz Alpert, P., Ben-Gai, T., Baharad, A., Benjamini, Y., Yekutieli, D., Colacino, M., Diodato, L., Ramis, C., Homar, V., Romero, R., Michaelides, S., and Manes, A.: The paradoxical increase of Mediterranean extreme daily rainfall in spite of decrease in total values, Geophys. Res. Lett., 29(11), 31-1/31-4, https://doi.org/10.1029/2001GL013554, 2002. Bresson, R., Ricard, D., and Ducrocq, V.: Idealized mesoscale numerical study of Mediterranean heavy precipitating convective systems, Meteorol. Atmos. Phys., 103, 45–55, https://doi.org/10.1007/s00703-008-0338-z, 2009. Castro, C. L., Cheng, W. Y. Beltrán , Y., A. B., Marshall Jr., C. H., Pielke, R. A., and Cotton, W. R.. The incorporation of the Kain-Fritsch cumulus parameterization scheme in RAMS with a terrain-adjusted trigger function. Fifth RAMS Users and Related Applications Workshop, Santorini. Greece, 2002. Cotton, W. R., Pielke, R. A., Walko, R. L., Liston, G. E., Tremback, C. J., Jiang, H., McAnelly, R. L., Harrington, J. Y., Nicholls, M. E., Carrio, G. G., and McFadden, J. P.: RAMS 2001: Current status and future directions, Meteorol. Atmos. Phys., 82, 5–29, 2003. Estrela, M., Millán, M., Peñarrocha, D., and Pastor, F.: De la Gota Fría al Frente de Retroceso, Centro Francisco Tomás y Valiente, UNED Alzira-Valencia Fundación CEAM, 2002. Estrela, M., Pastor, F., and Millán, M.: Air Mass Change along Trajectories in the Western Mediterranean Basin in the Torrential Rain Events in the Valencia Region, in: Mediterranean Storms, Proceedings of the 4th EGS Plinius Conference 2002, 2003. Federico, S., Avolio, E., Bellecci, C., Lavagnini, A., Colacino, M., and Walko, R. L.: Numerical analysis of an intense rainstorm occurred in southern Italy, Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci., 8, 19–35, https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-8-19-2008, 2008. Fita, L., Romero, R., Luque, A., Emanuel, K., and Ramis, C.: Analysis of the environments of seven Mediterranean tropical-like storms using an axisymmetric, nonhydrostatic, cloud resolving model, Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci., 7, 41–56, https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-7-41-2007, 2007. Kain, J. S. and Fritsch, J. M.: Convective parameterization for mesoscale models: The Kain-Fritsch scheme. The Representation of Cumulus Convection in Numerical Models. Meteorological Monographs, No. 46, American Meteorological Society, 165–170, 1993. Lebeaupin, C., Ducrocq, V., and Giordani, H.: Sensitivity of torrential rain events to the sea surface temperature based on high-resolution numerical forecasts, J. Geophys. Res.-Atmos., 111, D12110, 12110–12110, 2006. Lebeaupin, C., Ducrocq, V., and Giordani, H.: Two-way one-dimensional high-resolution airsea coupled modelling applied to Mediterranean heavy rain events, Q. J. Roy. Meteorol. Soc., 135, 187–204, https://doi.org/10.1002/qj.338, 2009. Miglietta, M. M. and Regano, A.: An observational and numerical study of a flash-flood event over south-eastern Italy, Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci., 8, 1417–1430, https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-8-1417-2008, 2008. Millán, M., Estrela, M. J., and Caselles, V.: Torrential Precipitations on the Spanish East Coast: The role of the Mediterranean Sea Surface Temperature, Atmos. Res., 36, 1–16, 1995. Millán, M., Estrela, M. J., and Miró, J.: Rainfall Components: Variability and Spatial Distribution in a Mediterranean Area (Valencia Region), J. Climate 18, 2682–2705, 2005. Molinari, J.: A General Form of Kuo's Cumulus Parameterization, Mon. Weather Rev., 113, 1411–1416, 1985. Pastor, F., Estrela, M. J., Peñarrocha, D., and Millán, M. M.: Torrential rains on the Spanish Mediterranean coast: Modeling the effects of the sea surface temperature, J. Appl. Meteorol., 40, 1180–1195, 2001. Pastor, F., Gómez, I., and Estrela, M. J.: Numerical Study of the October 2007 Flash Flood in the Valencia Region (Eastern Spain), Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci., in review, 2010. Peñarrocha, D., Estrela, M. J., and Millán, M.: Classification of daily rainfall patterns in a Mediterranean area with extreme intensity levels: The Valencia region, Int. J. Climatol., 22, 677–695, 2002. Pielke, R., Cotton, R., Walko, R., Tremback, C., Lyons, W., Grasso, L., Nicholls, M., Moran, M., Wesley, D., Lee, T., and Copeland, J.: A Comprehensive Meteorological Modelling System – RAMS, Meteorol. Atmos. Phys., 49, 69–91, 1992.