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We critically examined the performance of probabilistic streamflow forecasting in the prediction of flood events in 19 subbasins of the Doce River in Brazil using the Eta (4 members, 5 km spatial resolution) and European Centre for Medium‐Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF; 51 members, 32 km resolution) weather forecast models as inputs for the MHD‐INPE hydrological model. We observed that the shapes and orientations of subbasins influenced the predictability of floods due to the orientation of rainfall events. Streamflow forecasts that use the ECMWF data as input showed higher skill scores than those that used the Eta model for subbasins with drainage areas larger than 20,000 km2. Since the skill scores were similar for both models in smaller subbasins, we concluded that the grid size of the weather model could be important for smaller catchments, while the number of members was crucial for larger scales. We also evaluated the performance of probabilistic streamflow forecasting for the severe flood event of late 2013 through a comparison of observations and streamflow estimations derived from interpolated rainfall fields. In many cases, the mean of the ensemble outperformed the streamflow estimations from the interpolated rainfall because the spatial structure of a rainfall event is better captured by weather forecast models.

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This study investigates the potential of observations with improved frequency and latency time of upcoming altimetry missions on the accuracy of flood forecasting and early warnings. To achieve this, we assessed the skill of the forecasts of a distributed hydrological model by assimilating different historical discharge time frequencies and latencies in a framework that mimics an operational forecast system, using the European Ensemble Forecasting system as the forcing. Numerical experiments were performed in 22 sub-basins of the Tocantins-Araguaia Basin. Forecast skills were evaluated in terms of the Relative Operational Characteristics (ROC) as a function of the drainage area and the forecasts’ lead time. The results showed that increasing the frequency of data collection and reducing the latency time (especially 1 d update and low latency) had a significant impact on steep headwater sub-basins, where floods are usually more destructive. In larger basins, although the increased frequency of data collection improved the accuracy of the forecasts, the potential benefits were limited to the earlier lead times.

ResumoUma das principais aplicações das estimativas de precipitação por satélite é a modelagem hidrológica em bacias onde a rede convencional e em tempo real de pluviômetros são precárias no que se refere à resolução espacial e temporal de dados. Neste trabalho discute-se o desempenho do modelo de erro de precipitação por satélite estocástico multidimensional -SREM2D (do inglês, Two-Dimensional Satellite Rainfall Error Model), o qual simula conjuntos de campos diários de precipitação com os mesmos padrões estatísticos (dispersão) que a diferença dos campos de chuva estimados por satélite e pluviômetro de uma série maior. A maioria dos modelos tratam o erro como uma medida uni-dimensional sem o reconhecimento que a precipitação é um processo intermitente no tempo e no espaço. O modelo SREM2D caracteriza a estrutura espacial, a dinâmica temporal e a variabilidade espacial do erro de estimativa das taxas de precipitação. Este trabalho avalia os resultados das simulações do SREM2D para diversos algoritmos de estimativa de precipitação por satélite na bacia dos rios Tocantins-Araguaia. Resultados mostram que o conjunto obtido através das realizações do modelo SREM2D reduziram o viés dos algoritmos de estimativa de precipitação por satélite principalmente para bacias com área de drenagem superior a 12.000 km 2 . Palavras chave: modelo estocástico, métricas de calibração, estimativas de precipitação por satélite, modelagem hidrológica Evaluation of a Multidimensional Stochastic Error Model Applied to Satellite Rainfall Estimates AbstractOne of the most important applications of satellite rainfall estimates is the hydrological modeling in basins where the conventional and real time rain gauges networks are inadequate in term of the spatial and temporal resolution. This study discuss the performance of the multidimensional stochastic error model (SREM2D), which simulates an ensemble of daily precipitation fields with the same statistical patterns (spread) as the differences of satellite precipitation fields and rain gauges of a longer data series. Most models treat errors only in one dimension, without recognizing that rainfall is a time and space intermittent process. The SREMD2 model characterize the spatial and temporal structure, and the stail variability of errors, of rainfall estimates. This study assess SREM2D simulations results for several rainfall estimates algorithms in the Tocantins-Araguaia river basin. Results show that the ensemble derived from the SREM2D model reduced bias, of the satellite precipitation estimation algorithms mainly for basin with drainage area higher than 12000 km 2 .

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