Abstract:Based on 7 S-band dual-polarization weather radars in Ningbo and its surrounding areas, the paper develops a monitoring and early warning method of regional radar network for severe convective weather. Then, the novel method is quantitatively evaluated through 43 cases of severe convective weather. The result shows that the amount of data provided per minute by the regional radar network is about 2.66 times that of the single-site radar in Ningbo. And the radar networt can provide more information for the observation of boundary layers below 1 km. The novel method can respond promptly to severe convective weather in the monitored area. Hail warning and downburst warning can be advanced about 79.0 min and 42.6 min ahead of the observation, respectively. Compared to the single-site radar station in Ningbo, the monitoring and early warning method of regional radar network can identify the convective initiation about 4.0 min in advance, and warn hail and downburst processes about 12.2 min and 13.3 min in advance, respectively. At the same time, the early warning hit rate of the regional radar network for downburst triggered by γ-MCS reaches 100%. The method can be applied to all the central-east part of China and a small portion of the western and northeastern regions, covering approximately 44 000 km2 area. Especially, the method could have a good application potential in the Yangtze River Delta, the area from Hubei to Guangzhou and the area from Anhui to Shandong.