Project Status as of 27 August 2007:
Revision Phase
The final verifications and evaluations to this project have been completed, and results will be posted here shortly. A few aspects of this work will be re-examined and a new page will be posted to display the details of that work.

Forecast Threshold Maps
In order to make a yes/no forecast for thunderstorm genesis, the forecast probability must be compared to a threshold value. If it exceeds this value, a yes forecast is made, otherwise no flashes are forecast for that grid cell. On the following maps, areas of red indicate a 'yes' forecast, and areas of blue indicate a 'no' forecast. The overlaid flashes are the initiating flashes (up to 10% of the day's total flashes, occuring after 18 Z).

Four different threshold values are plotted on each map. The first (0.01) was the original value used to compute preliminary statistics. Three others (0.02, 0.085, and 0.075) were plotted to determine how different thresholds changed the forecast area.

These first maps are plotted based on the highest and lowest entries for several preliminary statistics. These statistics were calculated based on both individual cell performance as well as the performance of a 9 cell block (based on the averaged probability of the center cell and all adjacent cells). The statistics examined were Probability of Detection (POD), Overall Hit Rate (HR), Critical Success Index (CSI), Hit Rate for Non-Events (HRNE), and False Alarm Ratio (FAR). These statistics were checked for both total daily flash and initiating daily flash datasets.

Western Region - Individual Cell:

	Best		Worst
	Total Flashes	Initiating Flashes	Total Flashes	Initiating Flashes
POD:	August 12th, 2005	August 11th, 2005	July 7th, 2005	June 30th, 2005
HR:	May 1st, 2005	May 5th, 2005	August 12th, 2005	August 12th, 2005
CSI:	August 12th, 2005	August 11th, 2005	May 4th, 2005	June 20th, 2005
HRNE:	July 4th, 2005	June 9th, 2005	August 12th, 2005	August 12th, 2005
FAR:	August 10th, 2005	August 31st, 2005	May 4th, 2005	June 20th, 2005

Western Region - 9 Cell Composite:

	Best		Worst
	Total Flashes	Initiating Flashes	Total Flashes	Initiating Flashes
POD:	August 12th, 2005	August 11th, 2005	June 9th, 2005	June 9th, 2005
HR:	May 4th, 2005	May 5th, 2005	September 26th, 2005	September 26th, 2005
CSI:	August 12th, 2005	August 11th, 2005	June 9th, 2005	May 4th, 2005
HRNE:	June 2nd, 2005	August 11th, 2005	August 28th, 2005	August 12th, 2005
FAR:	August 10th, 2005	August 31st, 2005	May 4th, 2005	May 4th, 2005

Flash Day Frequency Maps
Eastern Region:
Regime 1 Regime 2 Regime 3 Regime 4 Regime 5 Regime 6 Regime 7
Western Region:
Regime 1 Regime 2 Regime 3 Regime 4 Regime 5 Regime 6 Regime 7

85th AMS Annual Meeting Materiels:
Awarded Best Student Poster Presentation for the 2nd Annual Conference on Meteorological Applications of Lightning Data!

Conference Pre-Print (PDF): A GIS-based approach to lightning studies for West Texas and New Mexico.
Conference Poster (PDF): A GIS-based approach to lightning studies for West Texas and New Mexico.

The general climatology (all wind directions) image has been produced and is posted here for viewing, along with hourly images. These climatologies are for May-September of 1989-2004 (excluding 2000). Wind direction distributions have also been produced and are being analyzed to determine proper wind flow regimes. Climatologies will then be produced for each regime.

All Hours, All Days (IDW_all.gif)

Hour 01 (00Z-01Z) Hour 02 (01Z-02Z) Hour 03 (02Z-03Z)
Hour 04 (03Z-04Z) Hour 05 (04Z-05Z) Hour 06 (05Z-06Z)
Hour 07 (06Z-07Z) Hour 08 (07Z-08Z) Hour 09 (08Z-09Z)
Hour 10 (09Z-10Z) Hour 11 (10Z-11Z) Hour 12 (11Z-12Z)
Hour 13 (12Z-13Z) Hour 14 (13Z-14Z) Hour 15 (14Z-15Z)
Hour 16 (15Z-16Z) Hour 17 (16Z-17Z) Hour 18 (17Z-18Z)
Hour 19 (18Z-19Z) Hour 20 (19Z-20Z) Hour 21 (20Z-21Z)
Hour 22 (21Z-22Z) Hour 23 (22Z-23Z) Hour 24 (23Z-00Z)

Animated GIF of hourly flash counts

Albuquerque(ABQ) Wind Distribution
Amarillo(AMA) Wind Distribution
El Paso(EPZ) Wind Distribution
Midland(MAF) Wind Distribution

Elevation map from NGDC GLOBE data(with rivers and lakes)

Lightning/Topography Countour Overlay

The region was cut in half along the 103.05 W line, producing east and west regions. Wind data for AMA was chosen as primary reference for east region, and wind data from ABQ was chosen as primary reference for the west region. The 700-500 mb mean wind was then calculated for each day, and plotted with the number of lightning strikes on that day.

AMA 500-700 mb Wind Distribution
East Region Lightning Strikes by AMA 500-700 mb Wind Direction
ABQ 500-700 mb Wind Distribution
West Region Lightning Strikes by ABQ 500-700 mb Wind Direction


Density Plot of First 10% of Afternoon Flashes
First 10% Flash Densities Overlayed on Topography
First 10% Flash Densities Overlayed on Flash Counts


Eastern Region Normalized Density Plot by Wind Regime
Western Region Normalized Density Plot by Wind Regime


East Region: Line Graph
Regime 1 - Northerly/Northeasterly Flow
Regime 2 - Easterly Flow
Regime 3 - Southeasterly/Southerly Flow
Regime 4 - Southwesterly Flow
Regime 5 - Westerly Flow
Regime 6 - Northwesterly Flow
Regime 7 - Calm Flow

West Region: Line Graph
Regime 1 - Northerly/Northeasterly Flow
Regime 2 - Easterly Flow
Regime 3 - Southeasterly/Southerly Flow
Regime 4 - Southwesterly Flow
Regime 5 - Westerly Flow
Regime 6 - Northwesterly Flow
Regime 7 - Calm Flow

*The shaded analysis area changes for some hours in the West Region maps. This is due to there being no strikes in the eastern portion of the region, and GIS not analyzing outside the bounds of data.




  email: gwagner@met.fsu.edu                                                                                                                 Page last updated: 8/27/07