Mi-Kyung Suk

Development of Unfolding Radial Velocity Algorithm for Dual PRF Mode of Yong-In Testbed(YIT) Radar

Weather radar is observation equipment that transmits electromagnetic waves and receives backscattered signals from the targets. The weather radar systems of the Korea Meteorological Administration have a doppler mode that can extract the target’s radial velocity. However, the radial velocity over the maximum unambiguous velocity(vm) for which is in a trade-off relationship with the maximum unambiguous range is folded. Therefore, a dual PRF mode of which transmits and receives signals using two different PRFs(high and low) must be used to extend the vm while maintaining the maximum unambiguous range. Using a dual PRF mode, vm can be extended to the amount of lowest common denominator of two observed vm from high and low PRF. For this extension, we have developed a velocity unfolding algorithm of which uses several criteria for classification considering observed velocity differences between high and low PRF and their error boundary. Then, correction factors are calculated for each class and are applied to unfold radial velocity. The developed algorithm was applied to the Yong-In Testbed(YIT) radar and the generated better performance of radial velocity extraction than those of the previous system.

Application of an empirical method to improve radar rainfall estimation using cross governmental dual-pol. radars

Three leading agencies under different ministries Korea Meteorological Administration (KMA) in the ministry of Environment, Han river control office in the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport (MOLIT) and Weather Group of ROK Air Force in the Ministry of National Defense (MND) have been operated radars in the purpose of observing weather, hydrology and military operational weather in Korea. Eight S-band dual-pol. radars have been newly installed or replaced by these ministries over different places by 2015. However each ministry has different aims of operating radars, observation strategies, data processing algorithms, etc. Due to the differences, there is a wide level of accuracy on observed radar data as well as the composite images made of the cross governmental radar measurement. Gaining fairly high level of accuracy on radar data obtained by different agencies has been shared as a great concern by the ministries. Thus, “an agreement of harmonizing weather and hydrological radar products” was made by the three ministries in 2010. Particularly, this is very important to produce better rainfall estimation using the cross governmental radar measurement. Weather Radar Center(WRC) in KMA has been developed an empirical method using measurements observed by Yongin testbed radar. This study is aiming to examine the efficiency of the empirical method to improve the accuracies of radar rainfalls estimated from cross governmental dual-pol. radar measurements. As a result, the radar rainfalls of three radars (Baengnyeongdo, Biseulsan, and, Sobaeksan Radar) were shown improvement in accuracy (1-NE) up to 70% using data from May to October in 2015. Also, the range of the accuracies in radar rainfall estimation, which were from 30% to 60% before adjusting polarimetric variables, were decreased from 65% to 70% after adjusting polarimetric variables.