Precipitation Characteristics in West and East Africa from Satellite and in Situ Observations

Abstract

Using in situ data, three precipitation classes are identified for rainy seasons of West and East Africa: weak convective rainfall (WCR), strong convective rainfall (SCR), and mesoscale convective systems (MCSs). Nearly 75% of the total seasonal precipitation is produced by the SCR and MCSs, even though they represent only 8% of the rain events. Rain events in East Africa tend to have a longer duration and lower intensity than in West Africa, reflecting different characteristics of the SCR and MCS events in these two regions. Surface heating seems to be the primary convection trigger for the SCR, particularly in East Africa, whereas the WCR requires a dynamical trigger such as low-level convergence. The data are used to evaluate the performance of the recently launched Integrated Multisatellite Retrievals for Global Precipitation Measurement (IMERG) project. The IMERG-based precipitation shows significant improvement over its predecessor, the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) Multisatellite Precipitation Analysis (TMPA), particularly in capturing the MCSs, due to its improved temporal resolution.