Integrated Convective Characteristic Extraction Algorithm for Dual Polarization Radar: Description and Application to a Convective System
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report (Previous Reviewer 2)
Thank you for making some of the necessary changes.
Reviewer 2 Report (New Reviewer)
This reviewer appreciates the addition of storm microphysics particularly, the enhanced ability to distinguish hydrometeor types, such as rain, hail, graupel, and snow, in each radar range bin, proposed by the authors.
The introduction does a very good job providing background for the paper. But it reads like it belongs to a paper derived for a different purpose. Adding a sentence, or two could help keep the reader in line with the contents of your paper and the message portrayed in your concluding remarks. Add a more specific purpose or objective of the paper. As submitted it leaves to much opportunity for the reader to make their own determination, which might not lead the reader to read this paper or worse.
Action requested of Authors: Identify a relevant objective/purpose with respect to this paper and add it to the introduction. This reviewer believes L725 - L729 of the Conclusion section provide the necessary components for said. Something like the following or an author improved version could be added to the introduction. Perhaps as its first sentence? ... 'This paper describes the development of the Integrated Convective Characteristic Extraction (ICCE) algorithm to contain an enhanced ability to distinguish hydrometeor types, such as rain, hail, graupel, and snow, in each radar range bin.' Then, if the first sentence for example, the rest of the introduction builds upon this statement in a very comprehensive manner.
How does the enhancements made under this study compare to TiTAN? TiTAN has been enhanced recently by Dixon and his team. A comparison to the historical algorithms including TiTAN will expand the readership of this paper and the likelihood that your scheme will be incorporated. This reviewer might have missed it. Please address in the revised paper.
Way too many sentences start as prepositional phrases, even for this non-English major. ... These kind of phrases make it more difficult to understand the true message of the author(s). As a result I recommended copy editing.
This manuscript is a resubmission of an earlier submission. The following is a list of the peer review reports and author responses from that submission.
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
General comments:
This paper shows the ICCE method and its application well. The authors introduce an integrated convective characteristic extraction (ICCE) algorithm based on SCIT and MDA methods and HCA output to identify, characterize, and track the movement of MCSs, with the data of four mesocyclonic hailstorms observed by the two S-band dual-polarization radars of Guangzhou Station and Meizhou Station in Guangdong Province, China, in 2019 and 2021. The manuscript is well structured and the content is mostly well illustrated. But, before publishing, several points relating to the ICCE algorithm and its application should be clarified. Furthermore, I would like to encourage the authors to send the manuscript on English revision by professional, pre-submission editing service.
Major comments:
1. The introduction is too long. Please delete the parts which are not strongly relating to the ICCE algorithm.
2. There are only some conceptual statements relating to the ICCE algorithm, that is, the methodology is not well demonstrated. Please give the details of the method. How did you realize the ICCE? Please deep into the processing details of the NCINRAD radar data.
3. The VPP method is not well illustrated. Please give the details. How do you judge the echoes belonging to the same MCS/cell in 3D space?
4. The authors should give some details of verification and validation associated with the ICCE application in the real cases.
5. There are so many acronyms in this manuscript. Please delete the acronyms which are unnecessary (less than 3-times repetition) or give a list of the acronyms in the appendix.
6. “MCS”, “MCSs” ,“Cell”, “Supercell”, “Hailstorm” , “Convective system” are used in this paper. Please pay attention to their differences and use them strictly in the analysis.
7. In Table 3, no definitions are given relating the so-called attributes, such as MCS top and many others.
Minor comments:
Fig.3 is not explained well. What is the meaning of the plus sign ”+”?
The caption of Fig.5 should not be omitted. Fig.5 is different from Fig.4.
The caption of Fig.9 should be improved. There are too many lines or signs needing further explanation.
Line217: Table 2. Algorithm usage NCINRAD dataset and collection mesocyclones. This sentence needs improvement.
Line388: The MCS microphysical attributes are listed in Table 2. “Table 2” should be “Table 3”?
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Reviewer 2 Report
Review of “Integrated Convective Characteristic Extraction Algorithm for Dual Polarization Radar: Description and Application of an MCS”
Rather than dwelling on a detailed discussion of a few missing words, for example, I have some major suggestions that I feel are necessary before resubmission.
First, of all the sections, the “Conclusions” section is by far the clearest. Therefore, I encourage the authors to incorporate the “Conclusion” section right near the start of the introduction essentially verbatim but replacing the abbreviations with real words so that the reader at the outset understands what this work is doing. This provides a lot of motivation for the reader to keep on reading.
Second, the authors must provide the reader up front with an index of all of the abbreviations and their meanings for more ready back-and forth referencing while trying to wade through the algorithm development. Clearly, the authors are intimate with this jargon, but an unsuspecting reader is not. An innocent reader is quickly submerged into a deep pool of abbreviations and a multi-page long discussions that sounds more like a manual than a paper. Granted that this journal is also interested in applications, it is, unfortunately, only toward the end that this work that elicits any real interest in this reader.
Third, the authors really do themselves a disservice with their figures, most of which need to be partitioned and displayed at scales which can be readily understood. As they stand now Figures 4, 5, 8 and 9 are essentially inaccessible sometimes even after blowing them up on the computer screen. Many of the lines and color coding is lost is such small figures and hence to the reader trying to understand the discussions of them. They all need to be redone.
Fourth, the authors really need to make really clear right at the outset how the dual-polarization observations are actually used other than in the title. For example, ultimately it is really only the radar reflectivity factor (Z) that is used to distinguish regions of graupel from regions of hail. Why is that? Are regions of heavy rain below the melting layer determined using the polarization variables like KDP or are they again simply using Z? That is not at all clear. As possibly a separate section in the beginning, this reader would rather hear more about how the polarization measurements are actually used rather than all the pages and pages of details about the design of the algorithm.
While the latter is necessary at some level, it should really be referenced either as an internal report somewhere or perhaps in a simple more outline form that can then reference more detailed discussions in extended Appendices. In my opinion, the authors would be much better off, instead, by using the main body a paper as a platform devoted to presentations of more exciting examples that would encourage an interested reader to explore more of the algorithm development on their own.
It is my philosophy to only reject papers that are out and out wrong. This one is not, but as it stands now, it is certainly a very painful experience.
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 3 Report
The manuscript shows a tool that integrates the results of algorithms created to extract information from radar data associated with mesoscale convective systems (MCS). This type of study is of great importance to build nowcasting systems and characterize MCS in different regions of the globe. However, the manuscript needs to improve aspects associated with the organization of the text and more adequate direction for the use of the generated data. Below I have some comments that may be useful to the authors.
Please, in my opinion, the publication of this manuscript still depends on the answers that will be given by the authors and the corrections to be made based on the comments below.
Major comments:
1. The description of the algorithm needs to be improved a lot. A flowchart with all the steps followed with the objectives of each one is necessary. Furthermore, it is highly recommended to specify the input parameters of each algorithm and it constrains. An example of the output (integrated data) is also necessary to exemplify how this data will be made available.
2. Results: Please address analyzes of the use of the integrated dataset and the systems tracking to a clear objective. Example, how these parameters vary before and after the occurrence of mesocyclones. Make hypotheses that can be verified later with this tool and more cases.
Minor comments:
Title: Please, avoid acronyms. Mesoscale Convective System instead of MCS.
Abstract and Table 2: Where did you analyze the 2021 event?
Line 47: “Hydrometeor Classification (HC) algorithm” instead of “hydrometeor classification algorithm”.
Line 48: remove: “is also called the HC data”
Line 160: correction: approximately
Line 183: NSCIT, this is the first time this acronym is used, what does the “N” stand for?
Line 219: Clarify, “longitudinal-by-longitudinal basis”.
Line 227: remove “algorithm”, since the "A" from HCA is already the “algorithm”. Please remove these occurrences (239, 274, 275, …) from the rest of the manuscript.
Line 281-287: I don't know the HCA in depth, but Do you know if RH and GR are classified based on a range of reflectivity values to define their classes? Please explain if this happens in this classification and if the reflectivity values shown in Figure 2 are a consequence of these ranges.
Lines 307-308: Is TITAN used in the original algorithm or are you using it in NSCIT? Or is it only a part of TITAN was used? It is unclear.
Line 309-310: Convective storm as an MCS doesn't seem right to me as they might not meet the mesoscale size criteria. Wouldn't Convective Cells be better? What do you say?
Line 312: Larger-scale MCS, this sounds more like something out of the mesoscale scale, that's right? or are you referring to systems that are larger? What would be better to say "larger MCSs"
Line 319: Please, is it the “mass” of the cluster? Please, explain.
Line 324: When you say "respectively" I expected one and then the other, but the figure is mixed and confused.
Lines 348-350 and 352-354: I have the impression that you are talking about overlapping areas. If so, just say that you used overlapping areas. In general this section 2.2.2 is very confusing, it needs to be redone.
Lines 376-377: Are you using SCIT? or NSCIT? It is not clear whether these "highest-reflectivity" are more intense than 35 dBZ and how much more intense they are.
Line 384: Why “relatively”?
Line 389: Is hail “always” present?
Lines 414-415: Wouldn't this be associated with the fact that the relaxation done by using only less intense thresholds (30 and 35dbz) in the NSCIT (in comparison with SCIT) is increasing the area of the cluster, thus increasing the probability of mesocyclones being inserted in them?
Line 442: It is Table 3.
Line 457: Very difficult to see black and blue lines in Figure 4b.
Lines 465 and 468: This 4 km limit is not described in the methods and there is no physical explanation for them. Please clarify its usage and make it clear in the methods.
Line 472: Very hard to see the differences between SCIT and NSCIT, please make the Figure more explanatory. Or think of another way to represent it.
Lines 494-495. Please, improve the figure and legend. Also, how do you explain these clusters with “DS”?
Section 3.1.2: (As Major comment 2) It is not clear what is the purpose of this analysis. Analyzing the trajectory of only one system within a limited area of the radar (“the total number of cells increase as more areas of MCS 1 come into radar observation field”) does not bring robust conclusions. Mainly about the impact of these new parameters on the trajectory of this type of MCS. Please explain the reasons for this analysis or perform more robust analysis on the characteristics of these parameters along the trajectory of the system. This may bring hypotheses to be analyzed in future work.
Line 502: what is the “requirements of size”? It is not explained on the methods.
Section 3.2: the case analysis needs to be redone more succinctly. Too much information without a direction for a specific analysis. Which makes reading confusing and uninteresting. The results of lines 647-663 are interesting but need to be shown through statistical analysis of what happens on average with each parameter before and after the occurrence of mesocyclones (As Major comment 2).
Line 551: I did not find in the Figure the “L-band sounding (gray cross)”. Also, it is very difficult to find the brown and cyan lines. Please improve the figure or represent it in a different way.
Conclusion: The conclusions do not provide much information about the cases analyzed and how to work on the hypotheses raised about the use of integrated data.
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Round 2
Reviewer 3 Report
Dear Authors,
Thank you for properly answering all questions.
Best wishes
