An evaluation of integrated water vapor, wind, and precipitation forecasts using water vapor flux observations in the Western United States

Differences between forecasts and observations at eight atmospheric river observatories (AROs) in the western United States during winter 2015/16 are analyzed. NOAA's operational RAP and HRRR 3-h forecasts of wind, integrated water vapor (IWV), integrated water vapor flux (IWV flux), and precipitation from the grid points nearest the AROs were paired with ARO observations presented in the NOAA/Physical Sciences Division's water vapor flux tool (WVFT). The focus of this paper is to characterize and quantify the differences in the WVFT observations and forecasts. We used traditional forecast evaluation methods since they were compatible with the design of the tool: a near-real-time visual depiction of hourly observed and forecasted variables at a single location. Forecast root-mean-squared errors (RMSEs) and unbiased RMSEs, standard deviations of the observed and forecasted variables, and frequency bias scores (FBS) for all of the fields, plus equitable threat scores for precipitation, are presented. Both models forecasted IWV at all AROs and the winds that drive orographic precipitation at most AROs within a reasonable range of the observations as indicated by comparisons of the standard deviations and RMSEs of the forecasts with the standard deviations of the observations and FBS. These results indicated that forecasted advection of moisture to the stations was adequate for generating precipitation. At most stations and most hourly precipitation rates, the HRRR underpredicted precipitation. At several AROs the RAP precipitation forecasts more closely matched the observations at smaller (<1.27 mm h(-1)) precipitation rates, but underpredicted precipitation rates > 2 mm h(-1).