engleski

Correlating hail properties with lightning characteristics in the hailstorms

Lightning characteristics are analyzed for ~ 40 cases of hail-producing thunderstorms occurring over Croatia in summer months (May to August), from 2008 to 2012. Lightning discharges are registered by the International Lightning Detection Network in Europe (LINET) which detects total lightning, but it also separately detects cloud to ground (CG) and intra cloud (IC) lightning discharges. Hail occurrences, based on data collected from a hailpad polygon located in northwestern Croatia were compared with registered lightning distribution. The hailpad polygon, consisting of 150 hailpads, covers the area of app. 600 km2 with approximate distance between hailpads of up to 2 km. Detailed analysis of lightning properties, such as number, type, polarity and electric current of lightning strokes before, during and after the time of hail occurrence was done. Additionally, the study also presents physical properties, i.e. number, diameter and kinetic energy of the hailstones detected on the hailpad polygon. In the majority of studied hail-producing thunderstorms the number of total lightning discharges sharply increases with the beginning of the hailfall. Larger hail stones with the higher kinetic energy values also fell at the beginning of the hailshower.

hailpad data; lightning; hail characteristics

nije evidentirano