• Korean Journal of Agricultural and Forest Meteorology
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.234-243
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• 2022

In Korea, hail damage occurs every year, and in the case of agriculture, it causes severe field crop and cultivation facility losses. Therefore, it is necessary to develop a hail information service system customized for Korea's primary production and crop-growing areas to minimize hail damage. However, the observation of hail is relatively more difficult than that of other meteorological variables, and the available data are also spatially and temporally variable. A hail information service system was developed to understand the temporal and spatial distribution of hail occurrence. As part of this, a hail observation database was established that integrated the observation data from Korea Meteorological Administration with the information from newspaper reports. Furthermore, a hail risk map was produced based on this database. The risk map presented the nationwide distribution and characteristics of hail showers from 1970 to 2018, and the northeastern region of South Korea was found to be relatively dangerous. Overall, hail occurred nationwide, especially in the northeast and some inland areas (Gangwon, Gyeongbuk, and Chungbuk province) and in winter, mainly on the north coast and some inland areas as graupel (small and soft hail). Analyzing the time of day, frequency, and hailstone size of hail shower occurrences by region revealed that the incidence of large hail stones (e.g., 10 cm at Damyang-gun) has increased in recent years and that showers occurred mainly in the afternoon when the updraft was well formed. By integrating multidisciplinary data, the temporal and spatial gap in hail data could be supplemented. The hail risk map produced in this study will be helpful for the selection of suitable crops and growth management strategies under the changing climate conditions.

• Environmental Engineering Research
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.84-91
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• 2018

The present study deals with the management of groundwater resources of an important agriculture track of north-western part of Saudi Arabia. Due to strategic importance of the area efforts have been made to estimate aquifer proneness to attenuate contamination. This includes determining hydrodynamic behavior of the groundwater system. The important parameters of any vulnerability model are geological formations in the region, depth to water levels, soil, rainfall, topography, vadose zone, the drainage network and hydraulic conductivity, land use, hydrochemical data, water discharge, etc. All these parameters have greater control and helps determining response of groundwater system to a possible contaminant threat. A widely used DRASTIC model helps integrate these data layers to estimate vulnerability indices using GIS environment. DRASTIC parameters were assigned appropriate ratings depending upon existing data range and a constant weight factor. Further, land-use pattern map of study area was integrated with vulnerability map to produce pollution risk map. A comparison of DRASTIC model was done with GOD and AVI vulnerability models. Model validation was done with $NO_3$, $SO_4$ and Cl concentrations. These maps help to assess the zones of potential risk of contamination to the groundwater resources.