Topographic Controls on Rainfall and Runoff.
Abstract
This report is concerned with the generation of rainfall in upland areas. It describes the results of research undertaken between 1981 and 1986 in the southern Pennine hills of north-west England. These hills rise to 600m, and although not mountainous by global standards, they provide a significant barrier to air masses moving over the area, particularly those originating to the west over the Atlantic ocean. The research aimed to combine hydrological and meteorological interests, being concerned with prevailing meteorological conditions and their associated rainfall systems, and with the effects of that rainfall on flood discharge of local streams. The first chapter reviews rainfall variation in time and space and emphasises the need for a distributed approach to rainfall studies. Chapter 2 describes the field site and instrumentation, in particular the errors associated with raingauges and the methods adopted to minimise those errors. The third chapter is concerned with the design of the raingauge network and includes the use of a Computer-Aided Experimental Design. The fourth chapter is a statistical analysis of daily rainfall patterns in the study area, and establishes the clear dominance of orographic rainfall distributions for the study area at the daily timescale. Chapter 5 presents the results of the field experiments at two scales; the Upper Derwent basin (15 sq KM), and the southern Pennine region (2500 sq Kme).
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Mar 01, 1986
- Accession Number
- ADA168667
Entities
People
- Sue Cooper
- Timothy P. Burt