1 JUNE 2018 TASZAREK ET AL.

4281

Climatological Aspects of Convective Parameters over Europe:

A Comparison of ERA-Interim and Sounding Data

MATEUSZ TASZAREK
Department of Climatology, Institute of Physical Geography and Environmental Planning, Adam Mickiewicz
University, Pozna n, and Skywarn Poland, Warsaw, Poland

HAROLD E. BROOKS
NOAA/National Severe Storms Laboratory, and School of Meteorology, University of Oklahoma, Norman, Oklahoma

BARTOSZ CZERNECKI
Department of Climatology, Institute of Physical Geography and Environmental Planning,
Adam Mickiewicz University, Pozna n, Poland

PIOTR SZUSTER
Department of Computer Science, Cracow University of Technology, Krakow, and Skywarn Poland, Warsaw, Poland

KRZYSZTOF FORTUNIAK
Department of Meteorology and Climatology, Faculty of Geographical Sciences, University of Łód
z, Łód
z, Poland

(Manuscript received 5 September 2017, in final form 20 January 2018)

ABSTRACT

We compare over 1 million sounding measurements with ERA-Interim reanalysis for the 38-yr period
from 1979 to 2016. The large dataset allows us to provide an improved insight into the spatial and tem-
poral distributions of the prerequisites of deep moist convection across Europe. In addition, ERA-
Interim is also evaluated. ERA-Interim estimates parameters describing boundary layer moisture and
midtropospheric lapse rates well, with correlation coefficients of 0.94. Mixed-layer CAPE is, on average,
underestimated by the reanalysis while the most unstable CAPE is overestimated. Vertical shear pa-
rameters in the reanalysis are better correlated with observations than CAPE, but are underestimated by
approximately 1–2 m s21. The underestimation decreases as the depth of the shear layer increases.
Compared to radiosonde observations, instability in ERA-Interim is overestimated in southern Europe
and underestimated over eastern Europe. High values of instability are observed from May to September,
out of phase with the climatological pattern of wind shear, which peaks in winter. From September to
April, favorable conditions for thunderstorms occur mainly over southern and western Europe with the
peak location and higher frequency shifting to central and eastern Europe from May to August. For
southern Europe, the annual cycle peaks in September with high values of inhibition suppressing thun-
derstorm activity in July and August. The area with the highest annual number of days with environ-
mental conditions favorable for thunderstorms extends from Italy and Austria eastward through the
Carpathians and Balkans.

1. Introduction
Denotes content that is immediately available upon publication
as open access. Around 9000 severe thunderstorm incidents causing
100 fatalities and 500 injuries are reported each year in
Corresponding author: Mateusz Taszarek, mateusz.taszarek@ Europe according to the European Severe Weather
amu.edu.pl. Database (ESWD; Dotzek et al. 2009). Unfortunately,

DOI: 10.1175/JCLI-D-17-0596.1
Ó 2018 American Meteorological Society. For information regarding reuse of this content and general copyright information, consult the AMS Copyright
Policy (www.ametsoc.org/PUBSReuseLicenses).
4282 JOURNAL OF CLIMATE VOLUME 31

TABLE 1. Number of 1200 UTC soundings used in the study given months and domains for years 1979–2016.

Western Central Europe Eastern Southern

Domain Europe and Balkans Europe Europe Other Total
Stations 20 24 23 20 32 119
Jan 15 249 17 865 13 747 13 004 22 292 82 157
Feb 13 975 16 478 13 035 12 049 20 805 76 342
Mar 15 449 18 060 14 553 13 319 23 177 84 558
Apr 15 536 18 124 15 262 13 146 24 055 86 123
May 16 207 18 561 16 172 13 603 25 332 89 875
Jun 15 587 17 953 15 452 12 968 24 895 86 855
Jul 16 124 18 223 15 780 12 978 25 282 88 387
Aug 16 589 18 597 16 074 13 078 25 848 90 186
Sep 15 599 17 812 15 283 12 494 24 340 85 528
Oct 16 048 18 346 15 393 12 995 24 812 87 594
Nov 15 494 17 870 14 693 12 819 23 422 84 298
Dec 15 778 18 318 14 935 13 274 23 351 85 656
Total 187 635 216 207 180 379 155 727 287 611 1 027 559

geographical bias toward densely populated areas and
errors in the databases make it difficult to determine the
true coverage of severe thunderstorms (Groenemeijer
et al. 2017). Lightning is detected more objectively (Betz
et al. 2009; Pohjola and Mäkelä 2013; Anderson and
Klugmann 2014; Poelman et al. 2016), but the networks
still suffer from spatial inhomogeneities and short re-
cord lengths. To overcome these issues, many re-
searchers have addressed the idea of using covariates
in the form of convective parameters (thunderstorm
ingredients; Doswell et al. 1996) that reflect environ-
mental conditions favorable for thunderstorms. The
relationship between these parameters and thunder-
storm occurrence allows them to be applied as a proxy
for the probability of different weather events occur-
ring (Allen and Karoly 2014). Understanding the cli-
matological aspects of convective parameters provides
an estimate of where and when the corresponding events
are the most likely to occur, subject to the quality of the
relationship between the covariates and the events.

FIG. 1. ERA-Interim model domain (individual grid points are represented by very small
gray pluses), ERA-Interim orography in meters above sea level (shaded color scale), location
of sounding stations (circles), and subdomains (black polygons). Filled red circles indicate
stations for which individual scatterplots will be shown later.
1 JUNE 2018 TASZAREK ET AL. 4283

TABLE 2. Description of model grid for ERA-Interim.
Resolution 0.758 3 0.758
Latitude extension 31.58–758N (59 grid points)
Longitude extension 278W–53.258E (108 grid points)
Vertical levels 1000–50 hPa 1 surface data (30 levels)
Total grid points 6372
Timeframe 1979–2016 (1200 UTC data)
Numerous studies using proximity soundings (radio-
sonde or numerical model profiles taken close to par-
ticular phenomena in space and time) assessed which
parameters can be regarded as valuable thunderstorm
predictors (covariates). The occurrence of thunder-
storms is strongly dependent on convective available
potential energy (CAPE), with values of roughly 100–
200 J kg21 discriminating between lightning and non-
lightning events (Craven and Brooks 2004; Kaltenböck
et al. 2009; Kolendowicz et al. 2017; Taszarek et al.
2017). Basing on European records, Westermayer et al.
(2017) suggested that the probability for lightning is
highest when CAPE exceeds 400 J kg21 and convective
inhibition (CIN) is no lower than 250 J kg21. They
highlighted that relative humidity in the low to mid-
troposphere has a major influence on storm occur-
rence with low relative humidity strongly suppressing
thunderstorms.
The presence of sufficient instability ensures that
convective updrafts, once initiated, can become strong.
Weisman and Klemp (1982) noted that vertical wind
shear promotes organization and longevity of these
updrafts. The establishment of dynamically forced
vertical pressure gradients can significantly enhance
the strength of the updraft, especially in supercell
thunderstorms. Using soundings from a global reanalysis
dataset, Brooks et al. (2003) found that environments
with high instability along with high vertical wind shear
were associated with thunderstorms producing severe
weather. The notion that the probability of convective
hazards is a function of thermodynamic instability and
deep layer shear (DLS) was also confirmed in many
other studies (Rasmussen and Blanchard 1998; Craven
and Brooks 2004; Brooks 2009, 2013; Allen et al. 2011;
Allen and Karoly 2014; Púcik et al. 2015; Taszarek et al.
2017). The height of the lifting condensation level
(LCL), along with low-level shear (LLS) and storm-
relative helicity (SRH; Davies and Johns 1993), were
found to be good predictors for tornadic supercells and
for estimating tornado intensity (e.g., Thompson et al.
2003; Groenemeijer and van Delden 2007; Grams
et al. 2012; Taszarek and Kolendowicz 2013). In ad-
dition, Grünwald and Brooks (2011) indicated that tor-
nadoes in Europe usually form with lower LCL and CAPE
than those occurring in the United States.
The climatological distribution of convective pa-
rameters may not be useful in making a forecast on a
particular day, but it can help in understanding the
baseline probability of a particular event at different
locations (Brooks et al. 2007). The annual cycles of
convective parameters at a variety of locations in Eu-
rope indicate that conditions supportive of severe
thunderstorms are the most frequent during spring and
summer (Brooks et al. 2007). The highest mean CAPE
is observed in the southern and southeastern parts of
Europe during summer, and the western part during
winter (Riemann-Campe et al. 2009). Brooks et al.
(2003) used data from a global reanalysis dataset to
develop covariate discriminants that identify an in-
creased probability of an environment to produce

TABLE 3. Parameters used in the study.

Parameter Abbreviation Units

0–500-m AGL mixed layer convective available potential energy ML CAPE J kg21
Surface-based convective available potential energy SB CAPE J kg21
Most-unstable convective available potential energy MU CAPE J kg21
0–500-m AGL mixed layer convective inhibition ML CIN J kg21
Theoretical maximum parcel updraft speed (square root of 2 3 ML CAPE) ML WMAX m s21
Theoretical maximum parcel updraft speed (square root of 2 3 MU CAPE) MU WMAX m s21
Theoretical maximum speed to overcome CIN (square root of 2 3 ML CIN) ML WINIT m s21
0–500-m AGL mixed layer lifted condensation level ML LCL m AGL
0–500-m AGL mixed layer mixing ratio MIXR g kg21
Precipitable water PW mm
800–500-hPa temperature lapse rate LR85 K km21
0–6-km AGL bulk shear (deep layer shear) DLS m s21
0–3-km AGL bulk shear (midlevel shear) MLS m s21
0–1-km AGL bulk shear (low-level shear) LLS m s21
0–3-km AGL storm relative helicity SRH03 m2 s22
DLS 3 ML WMAX ML WMAXSHEAR m2 s22
4284 JOURNAL OF CLIMATE VOLUME 31

TABLE 4. Mean errors and mean percentage errors from ERA-Interim for all analyzed parameters given various domains.

Mean error (mean percentage error)

Central Europe
Western Europe and Balkans Eastern Europe Southern Europe All
21
MIXR (g kg ) 0.17 (2.9) 0.14 (2.5) 0.11 (2.3) 0.24 (3.4) 0.15 (2.7)
LR85 (K km21) 0.13 (2.2) 0.14 (2.3) 0.03 (0.5) 0.12 (1.8) 0.11 (1.9)
MU CAPE (J kg21) 27.28 (19.5) 77.06 (35.2) 230.13 (214.1) 239.11 (46.9) 55.22 (24.6)
SB CAPE (J kg21) 30.02 (21.4) 85.95 (40.6) 23.89 (22.1) 259.99 (53.5) 69.73 (33.1)
ML CAPE (J kg21) 2.12 (5.5) 24.05 (25.4) 232.03 (236.9) 22.89 (22.5) 29.28 (213.6)
DLS (m s21) 21.28 (27.8) 21.12 (27.2) 21.30 (28.5) 20.81 (25.5) 21.09 (27.0)
MLS (m s21) 21.59 (215.7) 21.40 (214.4) 21.63 (216.6) 21.37 (214.3) 21.46 (215.0)
LLS (m s21) 21.83 (228.4) 21.51 (225.9) 21.60 (224.9) 21.69 (233.7) 21.61 (226.9)
SRH03 (m2 s22) 214.30 (211.9) 213.79 (212.1) 215.15 (213.2) 214.36 (212.9) 213.81 (212.1)
ML LCL (m AGL) 266.28 (27.2) 273.55 (26.4) 280.55 (26.8) 2186.57 (212.3) 291.98 (27.9)
PW (mm) 0.62 (4.0) 0.44 (2.8) 0.69 (4.7) 0.17 (0.9) 0.47 (3.1)
ML CIN (J kg21) 4.18 (38.6) 5.36 (33.9) 2.81 (24.0) 11.08 (19.1) 5.27 (25.7)
ML WMAXSHEAR (m2 s22) 26.21 (29.0) 211.67 (215.5) 222.59 (232.5) 28.76 (28.8) 210.41 (215.0)

severe thunderstorms and tornadoes. They estimated
the frequency of such environments for the whole
world based on relationships developed from data in
the United States. For Europe, they concluded that the
southern part has the greatest frequency of significant
severe thunderstorm environments. The preferred areas
for severe thunderstorms in the ERA-40 reanalysis
(Uppala et al. 2005) were also found along a zonal belt
over southern and central Europe by Romero et al. (2007).
In recent years, a growing number of studies have
analyzed long-term trends in convective parameters to
define how changing climate affects the occurrence of
severe thunderstorms. An increase of low-level mois-
ture over most parts of Europe from 1979 to 2012 was
seen in the reanalysis (Pistotnik et al. 2016). Steep
vertical temperature gradients became less frequent in
northwestern Europe and more frequent in south-
eastern Europe where CAPE increased as well. Future
changes of severe thunderstorm environments in Eu-
rope based on climate model simulations have been
addressed by Marsh et al. (2009). A small increase in
favorable severe environments was observed for most
locations resulting from an increase in the joint oc-
currence of high CAPE and high DLS situations. Púcik
et al. (2017) found that the simultaneous occurrence of
latent instability, strong DLS, and model precipitation
is simulated to increase by up to 100% in representa-
tive concentration pathway 8.5 (RCP8.5)1 and by 30%–
50% in the RCP4.5 scenario by the end of the century
in central and eastern Europe. An increase in the
number of severe thunderstorm environments in the
RCP8.5 scenario was also noted by Viceto et al. (2017)
for the Iberian Peninsula.
1
For further details see van Vuuren et al. (2011).
The majority of the climatologies discussed above
were based on reanalyses. Reanalysis products are
generated by the assimilation of observational data
(e.g., surface observations, satellite information, and
radiosondes) over a given period of time. The goal of
reanalysis is to provide a climatological snapshot of
conditions that are as close to reality as possible
(Thorne and Vose 2010). Data assimilation entails the
incorporation of observations into a background field
to produce an initial condition (Mooney et al. 2011).
Given the inherent uncertainties in the forecast
model, input data, and data assimilation, it is impor-
tant to assess the quality of these reanalyses (Hodges
et al. 2011). This was done for basic atmospheric pa-
rameters (e.g., temperature and dewpoint) in the nu-
merous studies (e.g., Tian et al. 2010; Mooney et al.
2011; Szczypta et al. 2011; Bao and Zhang 2013; de
Leeuw et al. 2015; Guo et al. 2016; Duruisseau et al.
2017), but only little attention has been paid to con-
vective parameters (e.g., thermodynamic instability).
Although Gensini et al. (2014) performed such an analysis
for United States and Allen and Karoly (2014) for Aus-
tralia, no efforts were made for Europe. Because convec-
tive parameters include information from basic quantities,
such as temperature, moisture, and winds, at a variety of
levels, they are a good test of the quality of a reanalysis.
In this paper, we compare over 1 million sounding
measurements with the ERA-Interim reanalysis for the
38-yr period from 1979 to 2016. The main focus is on
ingredients (predictors) supporting development of
thunderstorms and influencing their intensity. We look
at the spatial and temporal distribution of these pa-
rameters for both sounding and reanalysis data in order
to gain a better understanding of the evolution of the
atmosphere supporting thunderstorms. In addition,
ERA-Interim is evaluated.
1 JUNE 2018 TASZAREK ET AL. 4285

FIG. 2. Comparison of sounding observations and ERA-Interim proximity soundings (1 027 559 cases) for (top
left)–(bottom right) selected parameters. The gray line denotes a one-to-one ratio. The red line denotes the best fit
line. Value in the top-left corner denotes correlation.

2. Dataset and methodology
a. Radiosonde data
The radiosonde measurements were derived from
the sounding database of the University of Wyoming.
For the years 1979–2016 all available measurements
for 1200 UTC (1100 LT in western Europe and 1500 LT
in far eastern Europe) were downloaded from 132 sta-
tions over Europe (;1.3 million soundings). We focused
only on 1200 UTC because this time best represents the
4286 JOURNAL OF CLIMATE VOLUME 31

FIG. 3. Box-and-whisker plots representing monthly variability of (left) MIXR and (right) LR85 for sounding
observations (blue) and ERA-Interim proximity soundings (red): (top)–(bottom) western Europe, central Europe
and Balkans, eastern Europe, and southern Europe. The median is denoted as a horizontal line inside the box, the
edges of the box represent the 25th and 75th percentiles, and whiskers represent the 10th and 90th percentiles.

typical preconvective storm environment, as indicated by
peak cloud-to-ground lightning activity between 1400 and
1600 UTC (Antonescu and Burcea 2010; Wapler 2013;
Virts et al. 2013; Mäkelä et al. 2014; Taszarek et al. 2015;
Poelman et al. 2016). The highest frequency of severe
thunderstorm phenomena such as tornadoes, large hail,
or severe wind gusts is also estimated to peak in Europe
between 1500 and 1800 UTC (Groenemeijer and Kühne
2014; Taszarek and Brooks 2015; Punge and Kunz 2016,
Celi
nski-Mysław and Palarz 2017).
After quality control (discussed later), the final
number of stations dropped to 119 with over 1 million
1 JUNE 2018 TASZAREK ET AL. 4287

FIG. 4. (top) Mean annual values of MIXR for ERA-Interim and (bottom) sounding locations for (left) the cold season
(October–March) and (right) the warm season (April–September). A delicate smoothing was applied for better clarity.

soundings evenly distributed throughout the year
(Table 1). For statistical purposes, we clustered the
stations into four subdomains representing different
regions of Europe, each with distinctive climate con-
ditions. Those regions are western Europe (WE),
which is under the influence of the Atlantic Ocean and
humid oceanic climate, central Europe and the Balkans
(CE&B), located in the transitional zone between an
oceanic and continental climate, eastern Europe (EE),
representing a continental climate, and southern Eu-
rope (SE), consisting of stations under the influence of
the Mediterranean Sea (Fig. 1).
b. Reanalysis data
The European Centre for Medium-Range Weather
Forecasts (ECMWF) interim reanalysis (ERA-Interim;
Dee et al. 2011) was used for the period 1979–2016. The
dataset used has 0.758 horizontal grid spacing with 29
pressure levels from 1000 to 50 hPa. An additional 30th
level is the surface with temperature and dewpoint for
2 m above ground level (AGL) and U and V wind vec-
tors for 10 m AGL (Table 2). The research domain
extends from 31.58 to 758N (59 grid points) and from
278W to 53.258E (108 grid points), giving 6372 grid
points (Fig. 1). For each sounding site, we picked the
nearest (by geographical distance) grid point from the
reanalysis, and produced a pseudo-sounding from the re-
analysis to compare with the observational sounding. A
similar method was used previously by Thompson et al.
(2003), Allen et al. (2011), and Gensini et al. (2014).
c. Convective parameters
Convective parameters for both sounding and re-
analysis data were processed using a sounding analysis
program developed by Szuster (2016). For each profile,
pressure, height, temperature, dewpoint, and U and V
winds were interpolated in the vertical and the param-
eters that have shown value in predicting thunderstorms
and their intensities were calculated (Table 3). For
mixed-layer (ML) calculations, we used the layer from
0 to 500 m AGL. In addition, a virtual temperature
correction was included (Doswell and Rasmussen 1994).
To compute SRH and estimate storm motion, we ap-
plied the ID method (Bunkers et al. 2000).
4288 JOURNAL OF CLIMATE
FIG. 5. As in Fig. 4, but for LR85.
We defined cold (October–March) and warm (April–
September) seasons. This division was based on light-
ning activity over Europe, which is the highest from
April to September (Anderson and Klugmann 2014).
With our interest in convection, this seemed an appro-
priate choice. For the annual cycle of parameters asso-
ciated with CAPE or CIN we included only nonzero
CAPE cases. This approach was also applied in the pre-
vious studies (Rasmussen and Blanchard 1998; Brooks
et al. 2003; Craven and Brooks 2004; Brooks 2009;
Taszarek et al. 2017) and was intended to focus mainly on
unstable environments.
d. Quality control assumptions
Given the initial database of 1.3 million soundings, a
considerable number contained errors of various kinds,
including incomplete profiles and invalid or unrealistic
values. To deal with these, as a first step, we excluded
levels with incomplete measurements (e.g., temperature
was available but dewpoints were missing). Then, all
soundings with measurements not reaching 6 km AGL
or containing fewer than 10 pressure levels were dis-
carded. Next, temperature and wind vertical gradients
VOLUME 31
were checked, and we discarded soundings with obvi-
ous errors or unrealistic values, which we took as mid-
tropospheric lapse rates . 9 K km21, low-tropospheric lapse
rates . 11 K km21, DLS . 70 m s21, MLS . 45 m s21,
LLS . 35 m s21, MIXR . 20 g kg21, PW . 65 mm, MU
CAPE . 8000 J kg21, and ML CAPE . 6000 J kg21.
Since one of our motivations was to investigate the
annual cycle, we excluded all stations with fewer than
100 soundings measurements available in any month.
We also excluded stations if the difference between
the month with the fewest and most soundings was
more than 3% of available data for the station to avoid
biases toward particular months when calculating
climatological statistics. The number of soundings
per station that passed quality control assumptions is
listed in the appendix.
e. Limitations of the study
An important limitation to this study is the changing
quantity and quality of radiosonde measurements over
time (especially humidity), which impact derived vari-
ables such as CAPE and CIN (Guichard et al. 2000;
Cady-Pereira et al. 2008), as well as the availability of
1 JUNE 2018 TASZAREK ET AL. 4289

FIG. 6. As in Fig. 3, but for ML WMAX and MU WMAX. Values in parentheses at top left (right) denote ML
CAPE (MU CAPE). Only cases with nonzero ML WMAX and MU WMAX are used.

measurements, which in our database ranges from 4000
to 10 000 soundings per site. Although we are aware of
these issues, we believe that quality control assumptions
and the large sample size should limit their negative influ-
ence when focusing on large-scale climatological patterns.
Another limitation is related to the pseudosoundings
generated from ERA-Interim. Given the resolution of
the reanalysis (Fig. 1, Table 2), soundings located over
sharp boundaries such as mountains or coastal areas
may be not well represented in the model data. In some
cases, it is possible that the methodology of choosing
the closest grid point to the station location may not
be representative of the observations. Variations in the
depiction of the boundary layer (Brooks et al. 2003;
Thompson et al. 2003; Allen et al. 2011) and limited
vertical resolution of the reanalysis (30 levels) compared
4290 JOURNAL OF CLIMATE
FIG. 7. As in Fig. 4, but for ML CAPE.
to an average of 47 levels per observed sounding may
also result in differences between model data and ob-
servations. On the other hand, the reanalysis can be
more representative than station data with fewer verti-
cal levels on average, as is often seen in EE and SE
stations (see the appendix).
It is also possible that the model formulation may in-
troduce problems. As an example, given the horizontal
resolution of ERA-Interim, a convective parameterization
is necessary. This may lead to errors in the vertical
profile of temperature and moisture as a result of the
approximations associated with the parameterization,
and subsequent errors in CAPE. Similarly, quantities
associated with low levels may be impacted by the pres-
ence of boundary layer parameterization schemes. It is
beyond the scope of this paper to diagnose the source of
the errors, but it provides a caveat on the results.
3. Results
a. Correlation and mean errors
We will use the sounding observations as a baseline
for ‘‘truth’’ to compare the reanalysis data (although
VOLUME 31
we are aware that observations also contain errors).
The mean errors from ERA-Interim are within
0.15 g kg21 for MIXR, 0.11 K km21 for LR85, and
0.47 mm for PW, all close to the ranges for radiosonde
accuracy (Table 4). These parameters are also quite
well correlated with correlation coefficients greater
than 0.9 (Fig. 2). Larger differences are observed for
CAPE parameters. Among different parcel types,
ERA-Interim overestimates MU CAPE on average by
24.6%, and SB CAPE by 33.1% (Table 4). It is notable
that the highest overestimation is observed over
SE (46.9% and 53.5%, respectively), while an un-
derestimation (214.1% and 22.1%, respectively) is
seen in EE. Conversely, ML CAPE is underestimated
in ERA-Interim on average by 13.6%. The highest
ratio of underestimation is observed again over EE and
exceeds 36%. Scatterplots show a large spread, most
likely related to the high spatial variability of CAPE.
CAPE can change significantly from a few hundred to
even few thousand joules per kilogram over the dis-
tance of several kilometers, so that a ‘‘point to point’’
sounding and reanalysis comparison can show large
errors as a result of the gradients. Although the re-
analysis does not provide exactly the same values in the
1 JUNE 2018 TASZAREK ET AL. 4291

FIG. 8. As in Fig. 3, but for DLS and LLS.

same locations as the observations, the correlation
coefficients for MU and SB CAPE are approximately
0.7 (Fig. 2). A lower correlation (0.55) is observed with
ML CAPE, which indicates that the boundary may not
be depicted well in ERA-Interim, especially over EE.
The boundary layer parameterization is a likely can-
didate for such issues.
A comparison of shear values indicates that ERA-
Interim underestimates them by approximately 1–2 m s21
(Table 4). The highest ratio of underestimation is with
LLS (27%), decreasing with increasing depth (15% for
MLS and 7% for DLS). Scatterplots support the im-
proved estimation with height, with the correlation co-
efficient for LLS, MLS, and DLS being 0.74, 0.83, and
0.92 (Fig. 2). SE shows the largest underestimation of
LLS (33.7%) while it has the smallest underestimation
of DLS (5.5%). Again, the boundary layer is a likely cul-
prit. SRH is, on average, underestimated in ERA-Interim
4292 JOURNAL OF CLIMATE
FIG. 9. As in Fig. 4, but for DLS.
by 12% and no significant regional differences are seen.
The SRH in ERA-Interim is in better agreement with
observations when values are higher than 200–250 m2 s22
(Fig. 2).
ML WMAXSHEAR (a composite parameter of in-
stability and shear; Table 3), which is regarded as a good
severe thunderstorm predictor, is also underestimated in
the reanalysis data on average by 15%. This result is
heavily dependent on the choice of parcel type. We use
ML version for consistency with previous studies
(Brooks et al. 2007; Marsh et al. 2009; Brooks 2013;
Allen and Karoly 2014; Taszarek et al. 2017). Regional
analysis of this parameter indicates that it is under-
estimated most in EE (32.5%) and CE&B (15.5%) in
ERA-Interim. The correlation coefficient of 0.6 shows a
slightly better relationship than ML CAPE.
ML CIN was overestimated on average by 25.7%,
which means that convective inhibition was weaker in
ERA-Interim than in reality. The use of a limited
number of pressure levels in the reanalysis influences
the computation of CIN and leads to weaker convec-
tive inhibition in general. The largest differences were
observed over WE (38.6%) with the smallest over SE
VOLUME 31
(19.1%). The LCL computed with the use of ML
parcel is underestimated by ERA-Interim on average
by 8% (around 90 m). The largest errors (12.3%) are
observed over SE while the lowest are over CE&B
(6.4%). The correlation coefficient between re-
analysis and observation is 0.85 (Fig. 2).
b. Low-level moisture and lapse rates
Boundary layer moisture and temperature lapse rates
are often regarded as basic ingredients for thermody-
namic instability. MIXR usually peaks during summer
under strong diurnal heating and evapotranspiration.
The peak is earliest in EE (July) and latest in SE (August)
(Fig. 3). During the cold season, the lowest values are
observed over EE while the highest are over SE and WE.
High values are observed all year in the Mediterranean
basin (Fig. 4). Areas with elevated terrain (Spain, Turkey,
and the Alps) are characterized by lower MIXR on av-
erage. Results regarding the spatial distribution and an-
nual cycle of PW (not shown) are similar.
LR85 shows a less pronounced annual cycle with peak
values in the spring in all regions except the SE, which
has high lapse rates through August (Fig. 3). The highest
1 JUNE 2018 TASZAREK ET AL.
FIG. 10. As in Fig. 4, but for LLS.
values are observed over the area surrounding the
Mediterranean Sea (Fig. 5). The largest amplitude of the
annual cycle of LR85 is observed over EE, which during
the cold season has modest lapse rates. Conversely,
there are weak annual cycles over WE and SE. The
highest values of LR85 are usually observed in the early
summer when strong diurnal heating has begun in the
boundary layer but cool air masses still remain in the
midlevels. This is less pronounced (but still visible) over
SE and WE, which are heated all year by the warm
waters of the Mediterranean Sea and Atlantic Ocean.
The influence of the Gulf Stream during wintertime
results in enhanced lapse rates in the corridor from
Iceland up to the Norwegian Sea (Fig. 5). Although
LR85 derived from ERA-Interim seems to be quite well
correlated with observations, a slight overestimation is
apparent, especially during the cool season. The ex-
ception is EE, which has an almost perfect fit between
reanalysis and observational data.
c. Instability
The parcel theory estimate of vertical velocity (WMAX;
Table 3) associated with a value of CAPE has been used to
4293
describe the potential instability of the atmosphere and
has some advantages in presentation in comparison to
CAPE (Brooks 2013). Physically, there is no difference
between looking at WMAX and CAPE, but the display
naturally compresses the effect of extremely large values
of CAPE and allows us to see more details in the range
of low values. The warm season is characterized by large
values of instability with the timing of the peak slightly
later in SE than other regions (Fig. 6). The SE has the
highest peak of instability and largest amplitude of the
annual cycle, with WE having the smallest peak and
amplitude of the cycle. ML instability is underestimated
in EE, particularly in the cool season. MU instability is
overestimated by the reanalysis in the SE, particularly in
the autumn, making the annual cycle more asymmetric.
It is worth to highlight that except for EE, ML CAPE in
ERA-Interim has a good agreement with observations
for the summer season, but tends to be lower in the
winter when shallower less well-mixed boundary layers
are common. A spatial maximum of mean ML CAPE is
observed over south-central Mediterranean Sea during
the cold season, and central Italy during the warm sea-
son (Fig. 7). Observational data indicate also high mean
4294 JOURNAL OF CLIMATE VOLUME 31

FIG. 11. As in Fig. 3, but for ML WMAXSHEAR and ML WINIT. Values in parentheses denote ML CIN. Only
cases with nonzero ML WINIT and ML WMAXSHEAR are used.

values over northeastern Spain, the Carpathians, and
southwestern Russia.
d. Vertical wind shear
Vertical wind shear is an important parameter that in-
fluences storm organization and the potential to produce
severe weather. It is directly related to synoptic-scale
features such as the jet stream. Jets are strongest during
the wintertime, and this is when the highest values of wind
shear are observed (Fig. 8). The general climatological
pattern is anticorrelated with instability. Both DLS and
LLS peak in winter throughout Europe and the annual
minimum is during the warm season. Low values extend
somewhat later into September in the SE, where the
1 JUNE 2018 TASZAREK ET AL.
FIG. 12. As in Fig. 4, but for ML WMAXSHEAR.
annual cycle is weaker than in other regions. The highest
annual amplitude is in EE.
Shear values are usually underestimated in the re-
analysis (Fig. 8), consistent with previous work (Zwiers
and Kharin 1998; Brooks et al. 2003; Allen et al. 2011;
Duruisseau et al. 2017). A larger underestimation is
found in LLS than deeper layers, especially evident
during summertime when the 25th percentile of obser-
vational data is at the median of the reanalysis. Despite
the underestimate, the pattern of the annual cycle is
similar in the observations and reanalysis.
In the spatial analysis, the highest values of DLS in
ERA-Interim during the cold season are observed
over the British Isles, Norway, and the Alps while the
minimum falls on the western Mediterranean Sea
(Fig. 9). During the warm season, DLS is considerably
lower. A regional minimum is observed over the Uk-
raine. The spatial distribution of LLS indicates higher
values over northern Europe and lower values over SE
(Fig. 10). It is also notable that shear is higher over the
land surface than water. This is probably due to higher
friction over land, which contributes to slowing down
the surface winds, and thus enhancing overall shear
4295
magnitude for a given wind aloft. The highest clima-
tological observed values of LLS are found from
northern Germany to the British Isles throughout the
year. The reanalysis underestimates both DLS and
LLS over much of Europe but there is qualitative
agreement in the spatial and temporal patterns with
observations.
e. WMAXSHEAR and convective inhibition
WMAXSHEAR as the product of WMAX and DLS
can be calculated for any thermodynamic parcel. In
comparison to WMAX or DLS alone, the combination
leads to smaller differences between cold and warm
seasons. This is evident over WE, which has a weak
annual cycle in ML WMAXSHEAR (Fig. 11). Severe
thunderstorm potential over WE is roughly the same
throughout the year, based on this parameter, but
during wintertime it is mostly driven by high shear,
whereas during summertime it is driven more by in-
stability. Larger annual cycles are observed over EE
and CE&B. As with CAPE, peak values are observed
in the summer. Over SE, relatively high values are
observed throughout the year. The peak in annual cycle
4296 JOURNAL OF CLIMATE
FIG. 13. As in Fig. 4, but for ML CIN.
is 1–2 months later than over CE&B. Both reanalysis
and sounding data indicate that the highest warm sea-
son means of ML WMAXSHEAR are found from Italy
through the western Mediterranean Sea, with a second
corridor from the western Ukraine to Bulgaria (Fig. 12).
During the cold season, ML WMAXSHEAR peaks
over the central Mediterranean Sea and the waters
west of Norway, driven by the high shear, and relatively
warm water.
Regardless of high ML WMAXSHEAR indicating
the potential for severe weather, no storm will form if
convective initiation does not take place. For this
purpose, we analyze the convective inhibition (ML
CIN) and the theoretical parcel vertical velocity to
overcome CIN (ML WINIT; Westermayer et al. 2017)
for initiation. The annual cycle of ML CIN is similar to
ML CAPE, with the most negative values of ML CIN
during the summer, although the reanalysis has more
positive values than observations (Fig. 11). As sug-
gested by Westermayer et al. (2017), the probability
for a thunderstorm sharply decreases when CIN drops
below 250 J kg21. Such values are in general between
the 75th and 90th percentile of summertime distributions
VOLUME 31
over WE, SE, and CE&B (Fig. 11). This suggests that
the influence of ML CIN on the storm activity in these
regions is not very strong. Conversely, large negative
values of ML CIN are observed over SE, with sum-
mertime values frequently below 250 J kg21. The most
negative values are in the western and central Medi-
terranean Sea (Fig. 13), indicating that although high
ML WMAXSHEAR is frequently seen there (Fig. 12),
much of the potential convective activity is suppressed
by the CIN. This so-called severe weather efficiency
(Brooks 2009) has also been noted by Groenmeijer
et al. (2017), who found that the fraction of severe
thunderstorms compared to days with potential for a
severe thunderstorm (CAPE 3 DLS . 10 000 m3 s23) is
much higher over continental Europe (mostly between
0.6 and 0.8) than over the central Mediterranean Sea
(below 0.2).
f. Lifted condensation level
There are differences in ML LCL among various
regions. The annual cycle of ML LCL has the lowest
amplitudes over WE and the highest over EE (Fig. 14).
There are consistently high values in the warm season
1 JUNE 2018 TASZAREK ET AL. 4297

in all regions, with WE having the lowest ML LCL on

FIG. 14. As in Fig. 3, but for ML LCL.
average. The annual cycle for SE shows a nearly
monotonic increase from January to July, followed by a
decrease for the rest of the year. The highest values
during the warm season are observed over the regions
just north of the Mediterranean Sea and over the
eastern Ukraine and southwestern Russia (Fig. 15).
The smallest values are over northwestern Europe. The
reanalysis represents ML LCL well during the warm
season over all regions except SE, but tends to un-
derestimate it during the cold months. As with in-
stability, the largest underestimation of ML LCL is
seen over EE. Over SE, ML LCL is underestimated
throughout the year.
g. Annual cycles at individual stations
Apart from the general climatological overview, it is
worthwhile to look at individual locations to provide
more details on the annual cycle of shear and instability.
To do so, we have chosen six stations for each region
approximately evenly distributed in space and contain-
ing roughly 10 000 observations each (Fig. 1; also, see the
appendix). Following Brooks et al. (2007), we computed a
60-day running mean of ML WMAX and DLS for each
location.
Stations located on the western coast under the
strong influence of Atlantic Ocean (La Coruna, Brest,
and Stavanger) show a weak annual cycle of insta-
bility but large changes in vertical wind shear (Fig. 16).
Stations located farther to the east (Bordeaux, Trappes,
and De Bilt) have a similar shear pattern to western
stations, but have higher instability during summer-
time. The reanalysis represents observations relatively
well in Bordeaux and De Bilt but tends to un-
derestimate instability over Brest and Stavanger. Shear
is most notably underestimated over Brest, Trappes,
and La Coruna.
The annual cycles in CE&B resemble the shape of a
bow with substantial changes of both shear and in-
stability (Fig. 17). Although all the stations show sim-
ilar patterns, higher values of ML WMAX are observed
in the southern part of domain (Udine, Budapest, and
Bucharest). Shear decreases and instability increases
from January to July, with the pattern reversing in the rest
of the year. This is most obvious over the northern part of
the domain (Stuttgart, Prague, and Legionowo), whereas
in the southern part of the domain shear during the warm
season is relatively constant with changes only in the in-
stability. It is also worth noting that considerable values
of ML CIN (which contribute to convective suppres-
sion) are observed in July over Udine and Bucharest
(Fig. 17). Comparing reanalysis and observations, it can
be noted that shear is underestimated at all locations.
4298 JOURNAL OF CLIMATE
FIG. 15. As in Fig. 4, but for ML LCL.
The accuracy of the reanalysis instability varies with
the location, which may be a result of a complex Eu-
ropean orography not being well represented in the
reanalysis.
A similar pattern is observed in EE. The main dif-
ference is that the amplitudes of the annual cycles of
both shear and instability are larger (Fig. 18). As in the
previous domains, shear in the reanalysis is under-
estimated in each location, as is instability. Over some
locations (Moscow, Kiev, Rostov, and Saratov), the
underestimation of ML WMAX in summer is consid-
erable. This is of particular interest because all these
stations are located in the plains without complex
orography.
Unlike the other regions, most of the stations in SE
have a weak annual cycle of shear and large changes in
instability (Fig. 19). In the summer and autumn, ML
CIN is considerable and limits the development of
convection. In contrast to other locations, the reanalysis
tends to overestimate instability, particularly in the
western parts of the domain (Murcia, Ajaccio, and Ca-
gliari). These locations are in coastal regions or sur-
rounded by complex terrain. Athens has a very different
VOLUME 31
annual cycle than the rest of stations in SE. Small
changes in instability and large changes in shear are
more similar to WE than to Murcia located roughly on
the same latitude.
h. Frequency of thunderstorm and severe
thunderstorm environments
Since our main interest in this study is ingredients for
deep moist convection, we estimate the number of days
per year with conditions favoring severe thunder-
storms by using instability and shear parameters. A
similar approach was used in many previous studies
(Brooks et al. 2003; Trapp et al. 2007, 2009; Marsh et al.
2007, 2009; Diffenbaugh et al. 2013; Allen et al. 2014;
Allen and Karoly 2014; Seeley and Romps 2015; Púcik
et al. 2017). We define a potential thunderstorm day
if ML CAPE . 100 J kg21 and ML CIN . 250 J kg21
(Table 5), based on estimates of thunderstorm events
in Europe with their accompanying atmospheric con-
ditions (Kaltenböck et al. 2009; Westermayer et al.
2017; Kolendowicz et al. 2017; Taszarek et al. 2017).
The ML CIN term is used to exclude cases with inhi-
bition strong enough to suppress deep moist convection
1 JUNE 2018 TASZAREK ET AL. 4299

FIG. 16. Scatterplot of DLS and ML WMAX for chosen sounding sites in the WE domain. Lines and points represent 60-day
moving average for ERA-Interim (red) and sounding observations (green). Darker points represent the 15th day of month
numbered respectively for January, April, July, and October. Black points represent days in which mean 60-day moving average
ML CIN , 250 J kg21.

(Sander 2011; Gensini and Ashley 2011; Diffenbaugh
et al. 2013). A day with a potential severe thunder-
storm adds WMAXSHEAR . 300 m2 s22 (Taszarek
et el. 2017). However, we are aware that no discrimi-
nator will perfectly distinguish between severe and
nonsevere thunderstorm environments (Doswell and
Schultz 2006), and thus any such analysis will always
be subject to a probabilistic interpretation (Allen and
Karoly 2014).
During the cold season, conditions conducive to
thunderstorm development are mainly over the Med-
iterranean area, especially its central part, with a sec-
ondary maximum along the western coast of Europe
(Fig. 20). During the warm season, convective activity
moves inland. In the reanalysis, the most frequent
thunderstorm environments occur over Italy, Austria,
and the Balkan Peninsula, with a second region of high
frequency from Germany to western Russia. In the
observations, peak values occur over the Balkan Pen-
insula and EE.
Potential severe thunderstorms follow a similar pat-
tern to potential thunderstorm but with one-third to
one-half the frequency. In the reanalysis, more than
15 days per warm season occur in the Balkan Peninsula
and a corridor from Italy to Germany (Fig. 21). In the
observations, the Carpathians and most of EE have the
highest frequency. During the cold season, severe
thunderstorm environments are observed most often
over the central Mediterranean Sea.
From September to April the most frequent condi-
tions supportive of both thunderstorms and severe
thunderstorms are mainly over SE and WE (Fig. 22).
From May to August, the main storm activity moves to
EE and CE&B. For SE, the peak frequency is in Sep-
tember whereas in July and August thunderstorm ac-
tivity is suppressed due to considerable CIN. It is again
4300 JOURNAL OF CLIMATE
FIG. 17. As in Fig. 16, but for the CE&B domain.
evident that the reanalysis underestimates thunderstorm
environments over EE (Fig. 22).
4. Comparison with previous studies
Caution must be taken when looking at fields in-
volving strong vertical gradients, which the reanalysis
has difficulties with (Brooks 2009). Allen and Karoly
(2014) suggested that sharp horizontal boundaries such
as coastal regions or topographic boundaries may ex-
pose poor spatial resolution of the reanalysis. We sus-
pect that some of the errors we found may be associated
with strongly diversified orography and the coastline
of Europe.
The performance of the reanalysis in reproducing
observations has been analyzed in many previous
studies. Our work supports the result that kinematic
parameters are better represented in contrast to ther-
modynamic indices in a variety of reanalyses (Lee 2002;
Niall and Walsh 2005; Thompson et al. 2003, 2007;
VOLUME 31
Allen and Karoly 2014; Gensini et al. 2014). Zwiers and
Kharin (1998) pointed out that low-level winds in
the NCEP–NCAR reanalysis are underestimated. A
systematic underestimation of the wind speed in ERA-
Interim was also indicated by Duruisseau et al. (2017).
Both Brooks et al. (2003) and Allen et al. (2011)
pointed out that LLS is underestimated in the re-
analysis and suggested that this may be due to its poor
vertical resolution being not able to capture important
gradients.
Our findings concerning the climatological aspects
of CAPE and CIN are in agreement with Siedlecki
(2009), who analyzed individual sounding stations,
and Riemann-Campe et al. (2009), who used ERA-40
reanalysis. The highest means of CAPE over the Med-
iterranean Sea, the Balkan Peninsula, and southwestern
Spain were also noted by Romero et al. (2007) and
Pistotnik et al. (2016).
The notion of high (low) instability being associated
with low (high) shear was also pointed out by Brooks
1 JUNE 2018 TASZAREK ET AL.
FIG. 18. As in Fig. 16, but for the EE domain.
et al. (2007). In general, our study agree with their re-
sults that there is more variability in convective pa-
rameters in a cross section from north to south in central
Europe compared to one from east to west, mostly be-
cause of the increase in moisture from north to south. In
addition, in comparison to the United States, the lapse
rates and mixing ratios in Europe are lower, reflecting
the absence of source areas comparable to the Rocky
Mountains (lapse rates) or Gulf of Mexico (low-level
moisture). As a result, high values of CAPE are much
less likely in Europe than North America, as also seen in
Brooks et al. (2003).
The European lightning climatology has a peak
lightning density over northern Italy and the Balkan
Peninsula (Anderson and Klugmann 2014), which our
estimates of days with potential thunderstorms supports.
We also find a similar patterns in the annual cycle of
thunderstorms. Our results regarding the spatial distribu-
tion of severe thunderstorm environments agree with
Groenemeijer et al. (2017), indicating a peak frequency
4301
in northern Italy. Contrary to the ERA-Interim results
presented here, Púcik et al. (2017) found local maxima
of severe thunderstorm environments over southern France
and northeastern Spain using European Coordinated
Regional Downscaling Experiment (EURO-CORDEX)
data (Jacob et al. 2014).
5. Summary and concluding remarks
In this study, over 1 million sounding measurements
was compared with ERA-Interim reanalysis for the
38-yr period from 1979 to 2016. The large dataset allowed
us to provide an improved insight into the spatial and
temporal distributions of the prerequisites of deep moist
convection across Europe. In addition, ERA-Interim
was evaluated. Our findings are consistent with re-
sults from previous studies of thunderstorm environ-
ments in Europe (Brooks et al. 2003; Brooks et al. 2007;
Romero et al. 2007; Siedlecki 2009; Brooks 2009;
Pistotnik et al. 2016; Kolendowicz et al. 2017; Púcik
4302 JOURNAL OF CLIMATE VOLUME 31

FIG. 19. As in Fig. 16, but for the SE domain.

et al. 2017; Taszarek et al. 2017; Groenemeijer et al.
2017) but expand on that work because of the large
sample size.
ERA-Interim estimates basic parameters describing
moisture (MIXR) and lapse rates (LR85) well with
correlation coefficients of 0.94. Bulk instability param-
eters, such as CAPE, are not represented as well. ML
CAPE is, on average, underestimated while MU CAPE
is overestimated, indicating possible problems with the
boundary layer representation. Instability in ERA-Interim
TABLE 5. Definition of potential thunderstorm and potential
severe thunderstorm day.
Potential thunderstorm ML CAPE . 100 J kg21
ML CIN . 250 J kg21
Potential severe ML CAPE . 100 J kg21
thunderstorm
ML CIN . 250 J kg21
ML WMAXSHEAR . 300 m2 s22
is overestimated in southern Europe and under-
estimated over eastern Europe. Vertical shear pa-
rameters are better correlated than CAPE but are
underestimated by approximately 1–2 m s21. The rel-
ative amount of underestimation decreases from LLS
to deeper shear layers.
Enhanced values of instability are observed from May
to September, out of phase with the climatological pat-
tern of wind shear, which peaks in winter. From Sep-
tember to April, favorable conditions for thunderstorms
occur mainly over southern and western Europe, with
the peak location and higher frequency shifting to cen-
tral and eastern Europe from May to August. For
southern Europe, the annual cycle peaks in September
with high values of inhibition suppressing thunderstorm
activity in July and August. The area with the highest
annual number of days with environmental conditions
favorable for thunderstorms in the reanalysis extends
from Italy and Austria eastward through the Carpathians
and Balkans.
1 JUNE 2018 TASZAREK ET AL. 4303

FIG. 20. As in Fig. 4, but for the mean annual number of days with potential thunderstorm (ML CAPE . 100 J kg21
and ML CIN . 250 J kg21).

Although most of our results are not qualitatively
surprising, we have developed quantitative assess-
ments, leading to more precise descriptions of cli-
matological aspects of ingredients for deep moist
convection in Europe. Our results may be used as a
background for future studies on thunderstorm en-
vironments in Europe, and also can be a valuable
source of information for various groups such as
weather forecasters and insurance companies. Dif-
ferences that were found between ERA-Interim and
observational data indicate that researchers doing
work based solely on the reanalysis data should be
cautious when drawing conclusions regarding in-
stability and low-level shear parameters. Issues with
these near-ground parameters may be indicative of
the challenges in representing the boundary and
gradients within it. A similar caveat relates to areas
with strong horizontal gradients in topography, which
may lead to orographically induced mesoscale circu-
lations that modify the environment around the
mountain ranges and modulate latent instability and
shear being poorly represented in the reanalysis
(Púcik et al. 2017). However, as shown here, many
errors in ERA-Interim may not affect the qualitative
interpretation of results, but could lead to quantita-
tive differences if reanalysis-based thresholds are
applied directly to observed soundings. Severe thun-
derstorm discriminators (Brooks et al. 2003; Trapp
et al. 2009; Allen et al. 2011) or composite parameters
(Thompson et al. 2003; Sherburn and Parker 2014)
designed with certain models and domains should
be applied to other datasets and geographical loca-
tions with caution because they may not perform
quantitatively in the same way. Researchers using
reanalysis datasets to analyze convective variables
should consider examining the errors in parameters
before applying the results to other models or ob-
servations. Future studies will continue to address
this problem and more comparisons between model
and observational data will be available to assess how
well various numerical models represent the observed
environment.
4304 JOURNAL OF CLIMATE VOLUME 31

FIG. 21. As in Fig. 4, but for the mean annual number of days with potential severe thunderstorm (ML CAPE .
100 J kg21, ML CIN . 250 J kg21 and ML WMAXSHEAR . 300 m2 s22).

Acknowledgments. We appreciate valuable com- National Science Centre (Project No. 2014/13/N/ST10/
ments of Pieter Groenemeijer, John Allen, and anon- 01708). The lead author was supported by the doctoral
ymous reviewers who helped to improve this study. scholarship of the National Science Centre (Project No.
This research was supported by the grant of the Polish 2015/16/T/ST10/00373) and the Foundation for Polish

FIG. 22. (left) Mean annual number of days with potential thunderstorm (ML CAPE . 100 J kg21 and ML CIN . 250 J kg21) per
station given a particular domain: WE (green), CE&B (red), EE (blue), and SE (orange). (right) As at (left), but for potential severe
thunderstorm (ML CAPE . 100 J kg21, ML CIN . 250 J kg21, and ML WMAXSHEAR . 300 m2 s22). Solid (dashed) line indicate
estimates based on sounding observations (ERA-Interim).
TABLE A1. List of sounding stations (by WMO ID) including number of 1200 UTC sounding observations used in the study, average number of pressure levels per measurement, and
years of operation.

Avg. No. of Avg. No. of Avg. No. of

1 JUNE 2018

WMO levels per levels per levels per

ID No. sounding Years of operation WMO ID No. sounding Years of operation WMO ID No. sounding Years of operation
01001 11 525 44.4 1979–2016 10200 7412 56.0 1982–2011 17220 9240 42.3 1979–2016
01152 8935 37.6 1979–2014 10238 9745 56.7 1979–2016 17240 7820 42.6 1979–2016
01241 10 123 40.3 1979–2016 10393 8775 74.2 1991–2016 17281 3925 71.5 2005–16
01400 5416 45.6 1994–2016 10410 12 984 65.0 1979–2016 17351 6517 52.6 1994–2016
01415 11 054 41.2 1979–2016 10437 2336 22.4 1982–2004 22217 9578 42.5 1979–2016
02365 11 644 47.9 1979–2016 10548 8709 67.9 1991–2016 22271 9200 37.4 1979–2016
02527 8377 34.5 1979–2016 10618 9937 59.1 1979–2016 22522 8510 34.6 1979–2016
02591 10 132 47.5 1979–2016 10739 12 935 64.7 1979–2016 22820 6289 37.1 1979–2016
02836 12 747 50.8 1979–2016 10771 9615 59.1 1979–2016 22845 7417 34.3 1979–2016
02963 13 254 50.8 1979–2016 10868 12 954 56.7 1979–2016 23205 9237 33.8 1979–2016
03005 12 597 101.8 1979–2016 11035 13 215 45.5 1979–2016 26038 5559 22.4 1979–2013
03238 3225 126.6 2002–16 11520 13 343 53.6 1979–2016 26063 11 859 39.8 1979–2016
03354 4811 126.3 1997–2016 11747 4730 66.5 2003–16 26298 8256 38.2 1979–2016
03808 12 884 95.4 1979–2016 11952 12 410 53.2 1979–2016 26477 6708 42.0 1979–2016
03882 6284 100.4 1980–2016 12120 10 540 50.8 1979–2016 26629 5013 22.1 1979–2010
03953 12 491 39.6 1979–2016 12374 11 910 52.6 1979–2016 26702 5663 32.5 1979–2016
04018 11 331 45.5 1979–2016 12425 8060 61.8 1979–2016 26781 9750 36.8 1979–2016
06011 11 484 41.6 1979–2016 12843 12 286 34.7 1979–2016 27199 6196 48.4 1994–2016
06260 11 799 48.4 1979–2014 12982 5584 30.1 1979–2016 27459 6192 48.1 1994–2016
06610 13 134 48.2 1979–2016 13275 6270 30.2 1979–2016 27595 8764 34.7 1979–2016
07110 11 946 21.2 1979–2016 14240 6151 51.6 1996–2016 27612 10 426 38.2 1979–2016
07145 12 169 20.9 1979–2016 14430 4342 63.9 2002–16 27707 8744 35.7 1979–2016
TASZAREK ET AL.

07180 9234 17.5 1979–2011 15120 3580 19.6 1979–2010 27730 5700 55.1 1994–2016
07481 8803 18.2 1979–2009 15420 9337 46.0 1979–2016 27962 6241 46.0 1979–2016
07510 12 292 27.6 1979–2016 15614 11 125 29.7 1979–2016 27995 5144 54.1 1994–2016
07645 11 854 21.2 1979–2016 16044 12 697 57.8 1979–2016 33041 5993 35.3 1979–2016
07761 12 118 21.9 1979–2016 16080 12 466 60.2 1979–2016 33345 9699 29.4 1979–2016
08001 10 752 53.8 1979–2016 16113 3064 66.9 1999–2016 33393 3968 19.6 1979–2008
08023 9069 51.6 1986–2016 16144 5714 49.6 1987–2016 33658 4006 19.4 1979–1997
08160 6407 51.9 1992–2015 16245 9712 69.2 1987–2016 33791 4584 18.0 1979–2016
08190 2714 68.7 2007–16 16320 12 481 51.7 1979–2016 33837 4034 22.1 1979–1998
08221 11 425 60.6 1979–2016 16429 11 699 60.4 1979–2016 34009 10 492 36.2 1979–2016
08302 6846 69.3 1979–2016 16546 1750 103.7 2012–16 34122 8467 34.5 1979–2016
08430 10 162 60.3 1984–2016 16560 9737 55.7 1979–2012 34172 8614 36.6 1979–2016
08495 11 510 75.1 1979–2014 16622 5429 24.0 1980–2014 34247 10 340 37.9 1979–2016
08579 9762 33.5 1980–2016 16716 10 087 32.7 1979–2016 34300 4395 23.7 1979–1999
10035 13 015 52.7 1979–2016 16754 3964 29.6 1979–2014 34731 10 109 33.8 1979–2016
10046 2344 21.9 1980–1994 17030 9031 43.6 1979–2016 34858 9241 41.4 1979–2016
10113 1939 100.9 2011–16 17095 2644 85.1 2007–16 60390 10 587 26.9 1979–2016
10184 8703 69.8 1991–2016 17130 10 011 38.7 1979–2016 TOTAL 1 027 559 47.7 —
4305
4306 JOURNAL OF CLIMATE
Science (FNP). The reanalysis and sounding computa-
tions were performed in Poznan Supercomputing and
Networking Center (Grant 331).
APPENDIX
List of Sounding Stations
The observations used, average number of pressure
levels per measurement, and years of operation are
shown in Table A1.
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