ELEMENTS OF HYDROLOGIC CYCLE

PRECIPITATION
 Measurement of Precipitation
It is measured as vertical depth of water(or
water equivalent in case of snow) that would
accumulate if all the precipitation remained
where it had fallen.
Units
Inches
Cms
mm
 Instruments for measuring the
precipitation
Different types of rain guages are used to
measure the precipitation
Simple rain gauge
Tipping Bucket gauge
Weighing Guage
A Float
A simple rain guage
 It is an 8 in diameter collector .
They are not the recording type
The depth of water has to be manually read
from the gauge
Tipping Bucket
 The tipping bucket has two compartments or
buckets
Each bucket is designed to collect .01 in or 0.1
mm of water
Once one of the bucket is filled it tips and
empties its contents
During this the circuit is completed and a
current representing the given volume
recorded.
 In the meanwhile the second bucket collects
the precipitation
The same process follows.
This can only be used for rain
Snow has to be melted
Weighing type guage
 It measures the weight of rain or snow that
accumulates in a bucket
The bucket sits on a scale that is calibrated to
read an equivalent depth for a weight of
precipitation
In remote areas it has known to operate for
upto three months
A Float
 It is also used to record the depth of water
The float is placed in a collectors area
Or it is placed in a special reservoir of mercury or
oil
As depth of rainfall increases the float increases
It records the change in depth with rain
It can be easily damaged by freezing conditions
Network of Guages
 Interpretation and Quantification of
Precipitation
The rainfall data can be defined in terms of
Intensity of rainfall
Cumulative rainfall diagram
Duration of storm
Time distribution of rainfall
Return period and associated depth of rainfall
 Rainfall Intensity
It is usually measured in mm/hr or in/hr
It is reported in tabular or graphical form
Or a Hyetograph is used to represent the
rainfall intensity
A hyetograph is a graphical representation of
rainfall over time
Rainfall Hyetographs
Rainfall Intensity
 Cumulative Rainfall
It is a plot of cumulative rainfall versus time
It is useful in runoff studies
At any given time during a storm the intensity
is the slope of the rainfall curve at that point
in time
It can be used to determine cumulative rainfall
at any point during a rainfall event.
 Duration of the precipitation

It is the time from the beginning of the rainfall

event to the point where the mass curve or
cumulative curve becomes horizontal(look at the
previous slide
There may be several short periods of no rain in
between
No rain interval may vary with type of storm
In some cases it may be 5 hrs or in others 5 days
The choice depends on the use of rainfall data
 Time duration and associated depth is
calculated from the cumulative rainfall
diagram
 Calculating Average watershed
precipitation
Three common methods
Arithmetic Average
Isohyetal Method
Thiessen Polygon method
 Arithmetic Average
It is simple average of precipitation recorded
within a watershed
Isohyetal method
 Calculations
A B C D E
Isohyet (cm) Estimated EUD Net Area (Sq. % of total area Weighted
Km) Precipitation
(BXD) (cm)

Total Sum= Net EUD

 Calculations
A station B C D
Precipitation (cm) Net area (sq. Km) % of total area Weighted
Precipitation (AxC)

Total Sum of D = Net EUD