Sampling Error of Areal Average Rainfall due to Radar Partial Coverage

부분적 레이더 정보에 따른 면적평균강우의 관측오차

This study estimated the error involved in the areal average rainfall derived incomplete radar information due to radar partial coverage of a basin or sub-basin. This study considers the Han River Basin as an application example for the rainfall observation using the Ganghwa rain radar. Among the total of 24 mid-sized sub-basins of the Han River Basin evaluated in this study, only five sub-basins are fully covered by the radar and three are totally uncovered. Remaining 16 sub-basins are partially covered by the radar leading incomplete radar information available. When only partial radar information is available, the sampling error decreases proportional to the size of the radar coverage, which also varies depending on the number of clusters. It is general that smaller sampling error can be expected when the number of clusters increases if the total area coverage remains the same. This study estimated the sampling error of the areal average rainfall of partially-covered mid-sized sub-basins of the Han River Basin, and the results show that the sampling error could be at least several % to maximum tens % depending on the relative coverage area.