cff-version: 1.2.0
abstract: "<p><strong>Description:</strong> In-situ measurements of raindrop size distributions, fall velocities, drop number concentrations and surface rain rates recorded by an OTT Parsivel2 disdrometer named "PAR004" in Westmaas, The Netherlands. Westmaas is a village in the Dutch province of South Holland located approximately 15 km south of the city centre of Rotterdam, south of the old Meuse. The same site also features a micro-rain radar "MRR003_Westmaas" (since June 2022) and a Davis weather station "Davis003_Westmaas" (since May 2023). All sensors are placed on top of an air quality monitoring container belonging to TNO, at a height of approx. 4 meters. The container is located approximately 1.5 km to the West of the village of Westmaas, in a predominantly flat and rural area.</p><p><br></p><p><strong>Format:</strong> Each NetCDF file covers a full month of observations. The temporal resolution is 1 minute. Data are provided "as is", without any post-processing. The NetCDF files contain all relevant information about all the variables, attributes and units. The global attributes of the NetCDF files contain important information about the type of sensor, logging software, project contributors and history of the dataset. If a monthly file is missing, no data are available for this month.</p><p><br></p><p><strong>Relevance:</strong> Optical disdrometer data are useful for studying the type, dynamics and microphysics of precipitation from the perspective of a fixed observer on the ground. The data can be used to help calibrate weather radars, improve quantitative precipitation estimates, calculate the absorption/attenuation/propagation of electromagnetic signals through the atmosphere, and quantify important physical quantities such as liquid water content, rain amount, intensity and kinetic energy.</p><p><br></p><p><strong>Note: </strong>This dataset is updated approximately every 3 months. Please reach out to the authors if you wish to get access to the most recent data.</p><p><br></p><p><strong>Known issues:</strong></p><ul><li>Due to communication issues, the data from December 12, 2022 to January 3, 2023 have been lost.</li><li>Due to communication issues, the data from November 1st to December 19, 2023 have been lost.</li></ul>"
authors:
  - family-names: Schleiss
    given-names: Marc
    orcid: "https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4667-5500"
  - family-names: Castro
    given-names: Andre
    orcid: "https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7839-3698"
  - family-names: Mackenzie
    given-names: Rob
  - family-names: Sourzac
    given-names: Mahaut
title: "PAR004 Optical disdrometer data at Westmaas"
keywords:
version: 3
identifiers:
  - type: doi
    value: 10.4121/4e43e6dd-04ef-45d2-a05b-e36b752c2b5f.v3
license: CC BY 4.0
date-released: 2025-03-28