Spatial variability study of rainfal lin Cartagena de Indias, Colombia

Abstract

Precipitation is a component of the hydrological cycle, knowing its spatial distribution is vital for the management of hydrographic basins, the territory and the development of fundamental activities for society. That is why the present study shows the spatial variability of rainfall in Cartagena de Indias city with a network of rain gauges, made up of nine pieces of equipment, separated from each other by 0.9–27 km. After a year of recording (2019), using historical series of data, it was found that the maximum rainfall occurs in the trimester between September and November, with interpolated maps made by the Ordinary Kriging (OK) method it was found that the maximum rainfall is focused on the north, centre and west of the territory, instead, the maximum intensities are presented in the centre and west, the minimums for both variables are presented to the east and south. The 70 and 90% of the rain events have a duration of less than 30 min and 1 h, respectively. Three-parameter exponential function was fitted to the paired correlation distances, and presented correlations lower than 0.8, 0.5 and 0.2 from distances of 1, 3 and 7 km, respectively, in 30 min rain integration. It was also found that with a pluviometric network conformed by at least six pieces of equipment and separated by a 5 km distance from each other in the urban area, a correlation of 0.5 and compliance with the WMO recommendations would be obtained.