1.

Precipitation

Precipitation has to be considered the main component of the entire hydrologic cycle. It is a
key parameter of water balance.

The detailed study of precipitation and of all its aspects is properly the domain of
meteorology. In hydrology, precipitation is primarily of interest after it reaches the ground
surface. However, to gain a better understanding of the occurrence and
distribution of precipitation and its temporal and spatial scales, it is also useful to have a
knowledge of at least some elementary aspects of its generation mechanisms and of its
major types.

The term precipitation denotes all forms of water that reach the earth from the
atmosphere. The usual forms are rainfall, snowfall, hail, frost and dew. Of all these, only
the first two - rainfall and snowfall - contribute significant amount of water. Rainfall being
the predominant form of precipitation causing stream flow, especially the flood flow in a
majority of rivers in the country. The magnitude of precipitation varies with time and
space. Differences in the magnitude of rainfall in various parts of the country at a given and
variations of rainfall at a place in various seasons of the year are obvious and need no
elaboration. It is this variation that is responsible for many hydrological problems, such as
floods and droughts.

References:
Brutsaert, W. (2005). Hydrology: An Introduction. Cambridge University Press.
Subramaya, K. (2008). Engineering Hydrology. Tata McGraw Hill Publishing Company
Limited.
2. Formation of precipitation

Mechanisms
Several processes take place jointly in the formation of precipitation. In brief, these are the
production of supersaturation of the air, condensation of water vapor into ice crystals and
droplets, the subsequent growth of these condensation products, and the supply of moist air
to where the first three processes occur. These processes involve a number of different
mechanisms, which are briefly reviewed in what follows.

Cooling of the air

The water-holding capacity of air decreases, as its temperature decreases. Thus, air can
become supersaturated by being cooled down. Such cooling can occur by advection, for
instance, as warmer air moves over a colder surface, by radiative cooling or also as a result
of the mixing of two different air masses; but these are generally not very effective
mechanisms and only capable at most of fog formation or light drizzle. A more effective
mechanism of cooling of the air consists of its being lifted to higher elevations; in the
generation of precipitation this is by far the main mechanism. Air can be forced to rise by
being heated from below, by moving over mountainous terrain, or by frontal activity, that is
by having to move over relatively heavier, that is colder air. When the vertical air motions
are relatively weak and gentle, for example in the case of stable air in a warm front, the
lifting may result in what is referred to as stratiform precipitation. On the other hand, when
the air is already unstable, and the vertical motions are relatively strong, the
resulting precipitation tends to be of the socalled convective type. Under certain conditions
the movement of air over mountainous terrain can involve a combination of both stratiform
and convective precipitation.

Condensation and growth of condensation products

When the air reaches or exceeds saturation, water vapor may start to condense in the
form of liquid drops or ice crystals on the small nuclei, such as dust, smoke and various
types of salt particles, that are invariably present in the atmosphere. Initially, these
condensation products are small enough to be kept afloat in the atmosphere as cloud.
Condensation generates latent heat. Therefore, any further growth of these droplets and ice
crystals depends on the rate of diffusion of water vapor to their surface from the surrounding
air and on the rate of conduction of latent heat away from their surface into the air; in
the case of liquid droplets, there are also hygroscopic effects due to some nuclei,
surface tension and for the larger sizes, accretion. It can be shown (Fleagle and Businger,
1963) that the growth of droplets is primarily controlled by condensation up to radius sizes
of the order of 15 μm. Full-grown raindrop development to radii larger than 20 μm requires
accretion by collisions and coalescence with neighboring drops of different sizes and fall
velocities; this process, in turn, is affected by the turbulence of the air, the temperature
distribution in the clouds and electrical effects. In contrast, the growth of ice particles
depends only on vapor diffusion and on heat removal, and not on accretion; however, on
account of the lower vapor pressure characteristics of ice, the water vapor diffusion process
is much more effective than in the case of liquidwater. If the particle sizes continue to
increase, eventually they become too heavy and precipitation takes place. The onset
of precipitation on the ground depends on a number of conditions; most obvious among
them is that the condensation products must be large enough to fall down against the
entrainment of updrafts, and to overcome evaporation while falling down to the ground. A
rough rule of thumb for the demarcation between precipitation and cloud particle diameters
is around 0.1 mm. Substantial rates of precipitation usually can take place only when the
cloud thickness is 1200 m or more.

Moisture supply
Calculation of the precipitable water shows that even under the most favorable conditions
an atmospheric column at rest can hold only a very limited quantity of water vapor. For
instance (List, 1971), for a near-surface temperature of 20 ◦C and a surface pressure of
about p0 = 1000 hPa, a saturated atmosphere with a pseudoadiabatic lapse rate can at
most hold an amount, which is equivalent with about 5 cm of liquid water; for 10 ◦C this
precipitable water is only about half as much. Heavy precipitation amounts regularly exceed
such values. But even so, it is well known that the humidity of the air tends to remain
relatively constant during precipitation events. This means that it is not so much the local
precipitable water, but the horizontal influx of moist air into an area, that controls the local
intensity and the total amount of precipitation. The specific nature of this moisture influx
depends on the weather system.

Water recycling

In the study of regional water budgets over seasonal or longer time periods it is often
of interest to determine the origin of the water vapor producing the precipitation. Part of
this water vapor originates from evaporation outside the region, while the remainder
results from evaporation within the region in question. The precipitated water produced by
the evaporation inside the region can be referred to as recycled water. Water recycling has
been the subject of intensive investigations. Recycling of precipitation, or lack thereof,
resulting from the soil moisture conditions can be a strong feedback mechanism leading to
persistence of weather and climate patterns.

References:
Brutsaert, W. (2005). Hydrology: An Introduction. Cambridge University Press.
3. Forms of precipitation

Precipitation can reach the ground surface in different forms.

Drizzle is a very light, usually uniform, precipitation consisting of numerous minute droplets
with diameters in excess of 0.1 mm but smaller than 0.5 mm.

Rain is precipitation consisting of water drops larger than 0.5 mm. It can be classified as light
rain when the intensity is smaller than 2.5 mm h^−1, moderate when it is between 2.5 and 7.5
mm h^−1, and heavy when it exceeds 7.5 mm h^−1.

Snow is precipitation in the form mainly of branched hexagonal or star-like ice crystals, resulting
from direct reverse sublimation of the atmospheric water vapor; snow particles can reach the
ground as single crystals, but more often than not they do so after agglomerating as snowflakes.
These flakes tend to be larger at temperatures close to freezing. The specific gravity of snow
can vary over a wide range (Judson and Doesken, 2000), but as a rule of thumb for fresh snow it
is often taken around 0.1.

Sleet (North American usage) is precipitation consisting of fairly transparent pellets or grains of
ice, formed as a result of the passage of raindrops through a layer of colder air near the ground.
In British usage the word sleet refers to precipitation consisting of melting snow or a mixture of
snow and rain.

Glaze or freezing rain is ice deposited by drizzle or rain on cold surfaces.

Snow pellets (also called granular snow or graupel) are a form of precipitation consisting of
white, opaque, small grains with diameters between roughly 0.5 and 5 mm.

Small hail is precipitation consisting of white, semitransparent or translucent grains with

diameters ranging from about 2 to 5 mm. These grains are mostly round, and sometimes conical
in shape, and they have a glazed appearance. Small hail falls usually accompanied by rain, when
the temperature is above freezing.

Soft hail consists of round, opaque grains in the same size range as small hail, but they are softer
in appearance and tend to disintegrate more easily.

Hail consists of balls or irregular chunks of ice with diameters between 5 and 50 mm, or even
larger. These lumps of ice can be transparent or they can consist of concentric layers of clear and
opaque ice; such layered structure is the result of the alternating rising and falling movements
during the hail formation. Hail usually falls during violent and prolonged convective
storms under above-freezing temperature conditions near the ground; it can cause severe
damage.

Dew consists of moisture in the form of liquid drops on the ground surface and on the vegetation
and other surface elements, as a result of direct condensation of atmospheric water vapor. It
typically occurs at night on surfaces that have been cooled by outgoing long-wave radiation.
Hoar frost forms in the same way as dew, but the water vapor condenses directly into ice. These
ice crystals can assume a wide variety of shapes.

References:
Brutsaert, W. (2005). Hydrology: An Introduction. Cambridge University Press.
4. Different types of precipitation

The precipitation may be due to

(i) Thermal convection (convectional precipitation)—This type of precipitation is in

the form of local whirling thunder storms and is typical of the tropics. The air close to the
warm earth gets heated and rises due to its low density, cools adiabatically to form a
cauliflower shaped cloud, which finally bursts into a thunder storm. When accompanied by
destructive winds, they are called ‘tornados’.

(ii) Conflict between two air masses (frontal precipitation)—When two air masses
due to contrasting temperatures and densities clash with each other, condensation
and precipitation occur at the surface of contact, Fig. 2.1. This surface of contact is called a
‘front’ or ‘frontal surface’. If a cold air mass drives out a warm air mass’ it is called a ‘cold
front’ and if a warm air mass replaces the retreating cold air mass, it is called a ‘warm front’.
On the other hand, if the two air masses are drawn simultaneously towards a low pressure
area, the front developed is stationary and is called a ‘stationary front’. Cold front causes
intense precipitation on comparatively small areas, while the precipitation due to warm front
is less intense but is spread over a comparatively larger area. Cold fronts move faster than
warm fronts and usually overtake them, the frontal surfaces of cold and warm air sliding
against each other. This phenomenon is called ‘occlusion’ and the resulting frontal surface
is called an ‘occluded front’.

(ii) Orographic lifting (orographic precipitation)—The mechanical lifting of moist air over
mountain barriers, causes heavy precipitation on the windward side (Fig. 2.2).

(iv) Cyclonic (cyclonic precipitation)—This type of precipitation is due to lifting of moist air
converging into a low pressure belt, i.e., due to pressure differences created by the
unequal heating of the earth’s surface. Here the winds blow spirally inward
counterclockwise in the northern hemisphere and clockwise in the southern hemisphere.
There are two main types of cyclones—tropical cyclone (also called hurricane or typhoon) of
comparatively small diameter of 300-1500 km causing high wind velocity and
heavy precipitation, and the extra-tropical cyclone of large diameter up to 3000 km causing
wide spread frontal type precipitation.
References:
Raghunath, H.M. (2006). Hydrology. Principles-Analysis-Design. Second
Edition. New Age International Ltd. Publishers.

Subramaya, K. (2008). Engineering Hydrology. Tata McGraw Hill Publishing Company

Limited.
5. Point rainfall measurements

The main source of moisture for annual rainfall totals is evaporation from the oceans;
thus, precipitation tends to be heavier near the coastlines, with distortion due to orographic
effects—that is, effects of changes in elevation over mountain ranges. In general, amount
and frequency of precipitation is greater on the windward side of mountain barriers and less
on the lee side.

Considerable amounts of precipitation data are available from various local government
agencies (ex. PAGASA).

Time variation of precipitation occurs seasonally or within a single storm, and distributions
vary with storm type, intensity, duration, and time of year. Prevailing winds and relative
temperature of land and proximity of bordering ocean have an effect. One interesting
statistic is the maximum recorded rainfall that can occur at a single
gage. World precipitation records, shown in Table 1–3 , clearly indicate the effect of
proximity to major oceans, as in the case of India.

Hourly or even more detailed variations of rainfall are often important for planning water
resource projects, especially urban drainage systems. The intensity and duration of rainfall
events and spatial variations are important in determining the hydrologic response for a
watershed. Such data are available only from sophisticated rainfall recording networks,
usually located in larger urban areas and along major river basins.

Point rainfall can be plotted as accumulated total rainfall or as rainfall intensity vs. time at a
particular gage. The first plot is referred to as a cumulative mass curve ( Fig. 1–12 ), which
can be analyzed for a variety of storms to determine the frequency and character of rainfall
at a given site. A hyetograph is a plot of rainfall intensity (in./hr) vs. time, and one is
depicted in Example 1–2 along with cumulative mass curves for total rainfall.
Hyetographs are often used as input to hydrologic computer models for
predicting watershed response to input rainfall.
Statistical methods can be applied to a long time series of rainfall data. For example, rainfalls
of various duration ranging from 5 min to 24 hr can be analyzed to develop an estimate of, for
example, the 100-yr frequency event. These data are fitted with a contour line to form one of
the curves on the intensity–duration–frequency (IDF) curves in Figure 1–15 .
Other IDF probability lines are derived in a similar fashion for the 2-yr, 5-yr, 10-yr, 25-yr, and
50-yr design rainfalls. It should be noted that IDF curves do not represent the time history of
actual storms. Data points on an IDF curve are usually derived from many segments of
longer storms, and the values extrapolated by frequency analysis. It can be seen that the
intensity of rainfall tends to decrease with increasing duration of rainfall for each of the
IDF curves. Instead of analyzing historical rainfall time series, the IDF curves can be used
to derive design rainfall events, such as the 10-yr, 2-hr storm, which equals 2.0 in./hr, or the
10-yr, 24-hr storm, which equals 0.3 in./hr or 7.2 in. in 24 hr. One of the homework
problems indicates how this procedure is carried out. Such design storms are often used as
input to a hydrologic model for drainage design or flood analysis.

References:
Bedient, P.B., Huber, W.C., Vieux, B.E. (2013). Hydrology and Floodplain
Analysis. Fifth Edition.
6. Measurement of Precipitation

Rainfall may be measured by a network of rain gauges which may either be of non-
recording or recording type.

Non Recording Raingauges

Example of non-recording rain gauge is the Symon’s rain gauge used in India (Fig. 2.3). It
consists of a funnel with a circular rim of 12.7 cm diameter and a glass bottle as a receiver.
The cylindrical metal casing is fixed vertically to the masonry foundation with the level rim
30.5 cm above the ground surface. The rain falling into the funnel is collected in the receiver
and is measured in a special measuring glass graduated in mm of rainfall; when full it can
measure 1.25 cm of rain.

The rainfall is measured every day at 08.30 hours IST. During heavy rains, it must
be measured three or four times in the day, lest the receiver fill and overflow, but the last
measurement should be at 08.30 hours IST and the sum total of all the measurements
during the previous 24 hours entered as the rainfall of the day in the register. Usually,
rainfall measurements are made at 08.30 hr IST and sometimes at 17.30 hr IST also. Thus
the non-recording or the Symon’s rain gauge gives only the total depth of rainfall for the
previous 24 hours (i.e., daily rainfall) and does not give the intensity and duration of rainfall
during different time intervals of the day.

It is often desirable to protect the gauge from being damaged by cattle and for this purpose
a barbed wire fence may be erected around it.

Recording Rain Gauge

This is also called self-recording, automatic or integrating rain gauge. This type of rain
gauge Figs. 2.4, 2.5 and 2.6, has an automatic mechanical arrangement consisting of a
clockwork, a drum with a graph paper fixed around it and a pencil point, which draws the
mass curve of rainfall Fig. 2.7. From this mass curve, the depth of rainfall in a given time,
the rate or intensity of rainfall at any instant during a storm, time of onset and cessation of
rainfall, can be determined. The gauge is installed on a concrete or masonry platform 45 cm
square in the observatory enclosure by the side of the ordinary rain gauge at a distance of
2-3 m from it. The gauge is so installed that the rim of the funnel is horizontal and at a
height of exactly 75 cm above ground surface. The self-recording rain gauge is generally
used in conjunction with an ordinary rain gauge exposed close by, for use as standard, by
means of which the readings of the recording rain gauge can be checked and if necessary
adjusted.
There are three types of recording rain gauges—tipping bucket gauge, weighing gauge and
float gauge.

Tipping bucket rain gauge. This consists of a cylindrical receiver 30 cm diameter with a
funnel inside (Fig. 2.4). Just below the funnel a pair of tipping buckets is pivoted such that
when one of the bucket receives a rainfall of 0.25 mm it tips and empties into a tank below,
while the other bucket takes its position and the process is repeated. The tipping of
the bucket actuates on electric circuit which causes a pen to move on a chart wrapped
round a drum which revolves by a clock mechanism. This type cannot record snow.

Weighing type rain gauge. In this type of rain-gauge, when a certain weight of rainfall is
collected in a tank, which rests on a spring-lever balance, it makes a pen to move on a chart
wrapped round a clockdriven drum (Fig. 2.5). The rotation of the drum sets the time scale
while the vertical motion of the pen records the cumulative precipitation.

Float type rain gauge. In this type, as the rain is collected in a float chamber, the
float moves up which makes a pen to move on a chart wrapped round a clock driven drum
(Fig. 2.6). When the float chamber fills up, the water siphons out automatically through a
siphon tube kept in an interconnected siphon chamber. The clockwork revolves the drum
once in 24 hours. The clock mechanism needs rewinding once in a week when the chart
wrapped round the drum is also replaced.
Telemetring Raingauges
These raingauges are of the recording type and contain electronic units to transmit the data
on rainfall to a base station both at regular intervals and on interrogation. The tipping-
bucket type raingauge, being ideally suited, is usually adopted for this purpose. Any of the
other types of recording raingauges can also be used equally effectively. Telemetring
gauges are of utmost use in gathering rainfall data from mountainous and generally in
accessible places.

Radar Measurement of Rainfall

A meteorological radar is powerfull instrument for measuring the areal extent, location and
movement of rain storms. Further, the amounts of rainfall over large areas can be
determined through the radar with good degree of accuracy.

Meteorological radars operate with wavelengths ranging from 3 to 10 cm, the common
values being 5 and 10 cm. For observing details of heavy flood-producing rains, a 10-cm
radar is used while for light rain and snow a 5-cm radar is used. The hydrological range of
the radar is about 200 km. Thus a radar can be considered to be a remote-sensing super
gauge covering an areal extent of as much as 100,000 km^2. Radar measurement is
continuous in time and space.
Present day developments in the field include (i) Online processing of radar data on a
computer and (ii) Doppler-type radars for measuring the velocity and distribution of
raindrops.

References:
Raghunath, H.M. (2006). Hydrology. Principles-Analysis-Design. Second
Edition. New Age International Ltd. Publishers.

Subramaya, K. (2008). Engineering Hydrology. Tata McGraw Hill

Publishing Company Limited.