Discrimination Between Large and Small Hail.

摘要

This is one of four final reports provided by NSSL to Lincoln Laboratory. It documents work under task one and contains some material from the previous interim reports. We have concluded that estimation of hail size should be within the Hail Classification Algorithm (HCA). Currently the HCA has a category rain/hail which contains dry hail, wet hail, and hail mixed with rain. The challenge is to partition this category according to hail size. We propose a two phase approach. In phase one we gauge hail size of wet hail (often mixed with rain) at locations below the melting zone and have a crude estimate of size above the melting layer; this is reported herein. In phase two we will refine the algorithm in the dry hail category and extend it to include giant hail. Suggested modifications and a path towards an operational algorithm are presented.