This paper examines the spatial error structures of eight precipitation estimates derived from four different satellite retrieval algorithms including TRMM Multi-satellite Precipitation Analysis (TMPA), Climate Prediction Center morphing technique (CMORPH), Global Satellite Mapping of Precipitation (GSMaP) and Precipitation Estimation from Remotely Sensed Information using Artificial Neural Networks (PERSIANN). All the original satellite and bias-corrected products of each algorithm (3B42RTV7 and 3B42V7, CMORPH_RAW and CMORPH_CRT, GSMaP_MVK and GSMaP_Gauge, PERSIANN_RAW and PERSIANN_CDR) are evaluated against ground-based Asian Precipitation-Highly Resolved Observational Data Integration Towards Evaluation of Water Resources (APHRODITE) over Central Asia for the period of 2004 to 2006. The analyses show that all products except PERSIANN exhibit overestimation over Aral Sea and its surrounding areas. The bias-correction improves the quality of the original satellite TMPA products and GSMaP significantly but slightly in CMORPH and PERSIANN over Central Asia. 3B42RTV7 overestimates precipitation significantly with large Relative Bias (RB) (128.17%) while GSMaP_Gauge shows consistent high correlation coefficient (CC) (>0.8) but RB fluctuates between −57.95% and 112.63%. The PERSIANN_CDR outperforms other products in winter with the highest CC (0.67). Both the satellite-only and gauge adjusted products have particularly poor performance in detecting rainfall events in terms of lower POD (less than 65%), CSI (less than 45%) and relatively high FAR (more than 35%).

This study investigates the statistical characteristics of raindrop size distributions (DSDs) in monsoon season with observations collected by the second-generation Particle Size and Velocity (Parsivel²) disdrometer located in Zhuhai, southern China. The characteristics are quantified based on convective and stratiform precipitation classified using the rainfall intensity and total number of drops. On average of the whole dataset, the DSD characteristic in southern China consists of a higher number concentration of relatively small-sized drops when compare with eastern China and northern China, respectively. In the meanwhile, the D_m and log₁₀N_w scatter plots prove that the convective rain in monsoon season can be identified as maritime-like cluster. The DSD is in good agreement with a three-parameter gamma distribution, especially for the medium to large raindrop size. Using filtered data observed by Parsivel² disdrometer, a new Z–R relationship, Z = 498R^1.3, is derived for convective rain in monsoon season in southern China. These results offer insights of the microphysical nature of precipitation in Zhuhai during monsoon season, and provide essential information that may be useful for precipitation retrievals based on weather radar observations.

Characterizing the errors in satellite-based precipitation estimation products is crucial for understanding their effects in hydrological applications. Six precipitation products derived from three algorithms are comprehensively evaluated against gauge data over mainland China from December 2006 to November 2010. These products include three satellite-only estimates: the Global Satellite Mapping of Precipitation Microwave-IR Combined Product (GSMaP_MVK), the Climate Prediction Center (CPC) MORPHing (CMORPH), and Precipitation Estimation from Remotely Sensed Information using Artificial Neural Networks (PERSIANN), as well as their gauge-corrected counterparts: the GSMaP Gauge-calibrated Product (GSMaP_Gauge), bias-corrected CMORPH (CMORPH_CRT), and PERSIANN Climate Data Record (PERSIANN-CDR). Overall, the bias-correction procedures largely reduce various errors for the three groups of satellite-based precipitation products. GSMaP_Gauge produces better fractional coverage with the highest correlation (0.95) and the lowest RMSE (0.53 mm/day) but also high RB (15.77%). In general, CMORPH_CRT amounts are closer to the gauge reference. CMORPH shows better performance than GSMaP_MVK and PERSIANN with the highest CC (0.82) and the lowest RMSE (0.93 mm/day), but also presents a relatively high RB (−19.60%). In winter, all six satellite precipitation estimates have comparatively poor capability, with the IR-based PERSIANN_CDR exhibiting the closest performance to the gauge reference. Both satellite-only and gauge-corrected satellite products show poor capability in detecting occurrence of precipitation with a low POD (<50%) and CSI (40%).

This study assesses the performance of the latest version 05B (V5B) Integrated Multi-Satellite Retrievals for Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) (IMERG) Early and Final Runs over southern China during six extremely heavy precipitation events brought by six powerful typhoons from 2016 to 2017. Observations from a dense network composed of 2449 rain gauges are used as reference to quantify the performance in terms of spatiotemporal variability, probability distribution of precipitation rates, contingency scores, and bias analysis. The results show that: (1) both IMERG with gauge calibration (IMERG_Cal) and without gauge correction (IMERG_Uncal) generally capture the spatial patterns of storm-accumulated precipitation with moderate to high correlation coefficients (CCs) of 0.57–0.87, and relative bias (RB) varying from −17.21% to 30.58%; (2) IMERG_Uncal and IMERG_Cal capture well the area-average hourly series of precipitation over rainfall centers with high CCs ranging from 0.78 to 0.94; (3) IMERG_Cal tends to underestimate precipitation especially the rainfall over the rainfall centers when compared to IMERG_Uncal. The IMERG Final Run shows promising potentials in typhoon-related extreme precipitation storm applications. This study is expected to give useful feedbacks about the latest V5B Final Run IMERG product to both algorithm developers and the scientific end users, providing a better understanding of how well the V5B IMERG products capture the typhoon extreme precipitation events over southern China.

Version 5B Integrated Multi-satellite Retrievals for GPM (IMERG) products were evaluated with rain gauge observations as reference over the Nanliu River basin in Southern China since March 2014 to December 2016 through the Xinanjiang hydrologic model. The IMERG products include the early run satellite-only IMERG product (IMERGERUncal), final run satellite-only and gauge-corrected IMERG products (IMERGFRUncal and IMERGFRCal, respectively). Direct comparison with the gauge observations indicates that both early run and final run IMERG products have good performances in capturing the precipitation at spatial and temporal characteristics. IMERGFRUncal and IMERGERUncal show compatible capabilities to detect rainfall in a daily scale with highly correlative coefficient (CC) about 0.67, relative bias (RB) about −20.79%, and root mean square error (RMSE) about 10.68 mm. IMERGFRCal performed a little better than IMERGFRUncal and IMERGERUncal with higher CC (0.7) and lower magnitude of RB (4.90%). Simulated stream flows with daily IMERG products as forcing data show a large deviation from the observed stream flows with low Nash-Sutcliffe index (NSCE) < 0.3, indicating that all of these IMERG products have limited potentials of hydrological utilization in this basin. Particularly, IMERGFRCal shows relatively poor NSCE (0.28) and underestimates the stream flow by 7.83%. IMERGFRUncal and IMERGERUncal exhibit better performance than IMERGFRCal in the hydrological simulation with higher NSCE (0.30 and 0.29, respectively) and larger deviations with RBs about −56.73% and −59.49%, respectively. This result manifests that the IMERG products users need to be cautious when using IMERG products for hydrological applications in this basin. Additionally, this study is expected to offer insights into IMERG’ potentials in the hydrological utility and thus provide useful feedbacks to the IMERG algorithm developers and the users.