Aviation Weather Center (AWC) - National Convective Weather Forecast Product (NCWF)Aviation Weather Center (AWC) - National Convective Weather Forecast Product (NCWF)

Hazard field - Combining radar & lightning fields

Single click on the image to toggle between the VIL field and the gridded lightning field. As part of step 2, the cloud-to-ground lightning strikes are mapped to a grid by summing the number of strikes that occurred in the past 10 minutes within 8 km of a grid point. These data are then given a value based on table 1.

		Approximate Correlations
VIL (kg/m²)	Ltg. Rate (/10 min)	Effect	Airborne Radar	Reflectivity (dBZ)	VIP
12 +	15 +	Severe Turbulence, Lightning Hail likely	Level 4 Very Hazardous	50 +	5 - 6
6.9 - 12.0	6 - 14	Possible Severe Turbulence, Lightning	Level 3 Hazardous	45 - 49	4
3.5 - 6.9	3 - 5	Possible Severe Turbulence, Lightning	Level 3 Hazardous	40 - 44	3
0 - 3.5	NA	Light to Mod. Turbulence, Possible Lightning	Level 1-2 weak-moderate	0 - 39	1 - 2

Table 1: Approximate Correlations

As an example, if a grid point has a lightning rate of 8 strikes per 10 minutes, then the grid would be assigned a convective hazard value of 4.

The radar data are also mapped to the convective hazard scale. This scale is fundamentally the same as "VIP" levels.

Once the lightning data and VIL data are mapped to the same scale, the two field are combined by taking the maximum value at each grid point.

To see the combined field Click "Next".

To return to Echo tops filter image field click "Back".


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