2017 International Symposium on Lightning Protection (XIV SIPDA), Natal, Brazil, 2nd – 6thOctober 2017.
A Meteorological Variables Study and its Correlation
with Thunderstorm Activity Over Medellin City
(Colombia)
Diego Del Río, Camilo Younes
Department of Electrical, Electronic and Computer
Engineering
Universidad Nacional de Colombia
Manizales, Colombia
dfdelriot@unal.edu.co, cyounesv@unal.edu.co
Abstract— The present study shows an analysis of how the
atmosphere affects the thunderstorm formation in Medellin City
(Colombia). To carry out this study a meteorological station
located in Olaya Herrera Airport and a LINET Lightning
Locating System network were used. To understand the
atmosphere role, atmospheric pressure, near surface air
temperature, dew point temperature and wind measurements are
used. Results show that more than 60% of total lightning are
present during the periods of March-April-May and September-
October-November. This study ratify that Medellin is a city with
one of the highest lightning activity in the world with 202
thunderstorm days in average. Additionally, the diurnal cycle of
lightning activity shows that for all the analyzed periods more
than 50% of lightning detected are present between 11:00 and
17:00 hours in local time.
Keywords—Thunderstorms days, Non-Thuderstorms days,
Lightning strokes, pressure, temperature,
I. INTRODUCTION
Colombia is a country with one of the highest electrical
atmospheric activity on the Planet. According to Albrecht,
et.al. [1], seven of the top ten places with the highest lighting
activity (Hotspots) in South America are located in this tropical
country. Colombia is also one of the countries with the highest
rate of lightning deaths in the world. A study carried out by
Cruz, et. al.[2] has shown that Colombia has a death rate per
1,000,000 people of 2 fatalities while this vale in other
countries like United States, Canada or Brazil is 0.3, 0.2 and
0.8 respectively.
These high values of lightning activity have been reported
for the last two decades. While Colombia has some places with
a thunderstorm days (TD) values above 200 [4], the famous
lighting corridor of Florida State in US has a value of about 90
[3].
Medellin is a city where the electric atmospheric activity is
very high with a TD value of about 200, maybe the highest
value for a city with more than a million of inhabitants. This is
the reason for an elevated number of injuries and deaths caused
by lightning [2].
978-1-5090-6053-5/17/$31.00 ©2017 IEEE
Carlos Augusto Morales Rodríguez
DepartmentofAtmospheric Science
Universidade de São Paulo,
São Paulo, Brazil.
Carlos.morales@iag.usp.br
Medellin is the second most important city in Colombia. Its
metropolitan area has approximately 4 million inhabitants. It is
located in The Andes Cordillera at 1,500 m.a.s.l.
approximately. As a large city, it has traffic and air pollution
problems associated mainly to fossil fuels used for transport
and industry utilities.
This pollution issue combined with the high lightning
activity has forced the municipality’s authorities to install
enough meteorological stations with a good data information
availability that can be used together with a Lightning Location
System (LLS) data provided by LINET network that belongs to
the private company Keraunos S.A.S,.
The present study aims to characterize the main
meteorological conditions associated to TD and Not TD (NTD)
in the city of Medellin (Colombia) using LINET and Olaya
Herrera Airport Meteorological Station data for the years 2012
to 2014.
II. DATA AND METODOLOGY
A. Meteorological Variables
The meteorological variables used in this study were
obtained from the meteorological weather station located at
Olaya Herrera Airport of the Metropolitan Area of Medellin.
This station is has been working since 1941 and is located at 6°
13’ N and 75° 35’ W. The following are the variables used: Air
Temperature (T), Dew Point Temperature (Td), Pressure (P),
Wind Direction and Velocity. Finally, the period of time
analyze was the years 2012 to 2015 and between 6:00 and
18:00 hours in local time (LT).
B. Lightning Location System
The Lightning Location System (LLS) technology used in
this study is LINET. This System operates in the frequency
range of VLF/LF, it is a Total Lightning system using TOA
methodology and is compose by four modules: Module 1 is
formed by two loop antennas used to detect Magnetic Fields
Bx(t) and By(t) and detects signals in the range of 1 – 200 kHz,
No electronic circuit is used in this module. Module 2 is
composed by a GPS used to register the Signal Timing with a
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precision of 100 ns. Module 3 is for amplification, filtering and
signal processing purpose. Module 4 is called the processing
module [5].
LINET network in Colombia is composed by 15 sensors
located in strategic places of the territory as is described by [6]
and the Detection Efficiency (DE) is about 90% for the highest
efficiency zone. LINET network detect strokes and bring the
following related information: Time, Latitude, Longitude,
Return Stroke Amplitude, Polarity, Type of Stroke (Cloud to
Ground-CG or Intracloud - IC) and Waveform. Figure 1shows
the geographic location of LINET sensors in the Colombian
territory.
Figure 1 Geographical Location of Lightning Location System on Colombia
Territory and Location of Medellin.
C. Methodology
LLS Data is used to calculate TD and NTD, additionally to
observe monthly and hourly distribution of lightning activity
over Medellin Metropolitan Area. Four different categories or
periods are analyzed depending on the moment of the year, this
is due to the variability of lightning activity during the year in
Colombia, the categories are: 1. December-January-February
(DJF). 2. March-April-May (MAM). 3. June-July-August
(JJA). 4. September-October-November (SON).
Once TD and NTD is calculated, meteorological station
data is used to calculate the Diurnal Mean Cycle of
meteorological variables for each one of the Categories over
the period of analysis (2012-2015).
The methodology used for the analysis of meteorological
variables is described deeply in [7]. In order to observe if there
are important differences between TD and NTD data, a t-
student proof with a confidence level of 95% is used [8].
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III. RESULTS
A. Lightning Distribution of TDand NTD
Using data over the analyzed period (2012-2015) it was
found that 56% of the days were TD, equivalent to 811 days.
Additionally, it was found that Medellin has a Mean TD of 202
per year. To understand how the lightning activity is temporal
distributed, Fig. 2 shows the monthly activity in percentage of
detected LINET strokes. This annual cycle plot presents two
periods of maximum activity, i.e., one centered in April and the
other on October. In DJF and JJA periods present the lowest
lightning activity while MAM and SON show the highest.
About 60% of the total lightning detected in the period of time
analyzed occurred in MAM and SON.
Fig. 3 shows the mean of TD evaluated over Medellin and
it is possible to observe bimodal distribution as well. This
feature confirms the reported results in [4] with the maximum
values during the moths of May and October.
Figure 2 Mean distribution of strokes detected by LINET during 2012-2015
for Medellin in percentage.
B. Diurnal Cycle
On basis of the annual distribution some graphics were
elaborated separately for the Categories with the highest
activity (MAM and SON) and the Categories with the lowest
values (DJF and JJA). Fig. 4 shows the percentage of lightning
hourly for each Category. As it can be observed, more than
60% of lightning detected occurs between 14:00 and 23:00
hours in local time.
Fig.5 shows the diurnal cycle of atmospheric pressure for
each category. It is possible to observe that this atmospheric
variable is higher for TD curve, nevertheless some significance
differences occur when atmospheric pressure decrease between
14:00 and 18:00 hours in LT in all Categories and coincides
with the period where more of the lightning activity occurs as it
can be contrasted and observed in Fig. 4.
 than TD data has lower amplitude values in comparison with
NTD data for the same compared periods, except for MAM.

Figure 4 Monthly distribution of Thunderstorms Days (TD) in Medellin.

Figure 5 Diurnal mean cycle of air surface pressure. The vertical error bars are
the standard deviation. The * indicate the statistically significant differences at
95% level.

To understand how humid the atmosphere is, Table 2 and Fig.

7 show the mean Td diurnal cycle for each season. It can be
observed that TD periods have higher Td, therefore days with
lightning activity present more moisture in the atmospheric
than the days without thunderstorms. This result is consistent
with previous studies reported [7, 8 ,9].

Figure 3 Diurnal mean Cycle of lightning strokes for DJF, MAM, JJA and SON.

Fig. 6 shows the diurnal cycle of air temperature in

Medellin. It is possible to observe that NTD are warmer than
TD, which is different from other studies [7, 8, 9] that reported
warmer days for TD. During MAM and SON the differences in
the afternoon a statistically significant and can reach as much
as 2oC. Moreover, TD shows the maximum temperatures one
hour earlier when comparing with NTD, i.e., 13-14 LT and 15-
16 LT respectively.
Figure 6 Diurnal mean cycle of Air Temperature (°C). The vertical error
In order to analyze this with a highest detail, a data table bars are the standard deviation. * indicates the statistically significant
was constructed. Table 1 shows the mean, maximum, differences at 95% level.
minimum, standard deviation and amplitude for TD and NTD
data.
To characterize the available moisture in the atmosphere we
As it can be observed, comparing TD and NTD minimum have computed the mixing ratio, which reflects the amount of
values, TD data register highest values than NTD data for DJF water vapor in the atmosphere. Fig. 8 shows the mixing ratio
and JJA periods. Additionally, during the highest lightning diurnal cycle for TD and NTD during the four periods
activity periods MAM and SON, NTD register values of analyzed. As it can be observed, TD days present higher values
minimum temperatures higher than TD set of data, of humidity in the atmosphere. It is possible to observe the
nevertheless, comparing amplitudes values, it can be observed humidity decrease between 6:00 and 14:00 hours LT and then

99
it increases until 18:00 hours, which is consistent with most of between 14:00 and 18:00. In the case of NTD winds come from
the atmospheric activity registered. north with higher intensity between 10:00 and 12:00 and then it
decreases to a very close to zero value.
Table 1 Mean, Standard deviation, Minimum, maximum, and diurnal
amplitude (difference between maximum and minimum value during the day)
of air temperature for Thunderstorms Days (TD) and Non-Thunderstorms
Days (NTD) in Medellin city.

TD
T(°C) DJF MAM JJA SON
Mean 23.11 23.53 24.38 23.39
Std 1.73 1.89 1.81 1.94
Max 26.82 27.09 27.81 26.92
Min 18.00 17.00 18.48 18.28
Ampl 8.82 10.09 9.33 8.64
NTD
T(°C) DJF MAM JJA SON
Mean 23.99 24.59 25.03 24.27
Std 1.59 1.73 1.40 1.80
Max 27.48 27.83 28.72 27.59 Figure 7 Mean Diurnal Cycle of dew-point Temperature (Tw), for DJF,
MAM, JJA, SON. The * indicate the statistically significant differences at 95%
Min 15.00 18.60 15.00 18.40
level.
Ampl 12.48 9.23 13.72 9.19

Meridional wind curves for JJA and SON has a special

Fig. 9 and Fig. 10 show the zonal and meridional wind for
each period of time. These parameters describe the origin of the
winds, in other words, where the winds come from. As it can
be observed, in general terms, zonal and meridional winds
curves are lower for TD than for NTD.
behavior showing a tendency from north between 9:00 and
13:00 hours and then an increasing tendency between 14:00
and 18:00 that implies winds coming from south. This is
consistent with the time of the year where winds coming from
the south start becoming more predominant.

Table 2 Mean, standard deviation, maximum, minimum, and amplitude of

dew point temperature (Tw) for TD and NTD, in Medellin city.

TD
DJF MAM JJA SON
Mean 14.78 15.07 14.13 14.96
Std 1.48 1.41 1.65 1.55
Max 20.00 16.35 23.00 16.11
Min 13.54 13.00 12.75 14.00
Ampl 6.46 3.35 10.25 2.11
NTD
DJF MAM JJA SON
Media 14.01 14.49 13.07 14.15
Std 1.69 1.43 1.64 1.84
Max 15.76 16.23 17.00 15.89
Min 12.32 13.16 11.00 11.00 Figure 8 Mixing ration (g/kg) for TD and NTD
Ampl 3.44 3.07 6.00 4.89 Fig. 11 shows the wind magnitude (Velocity) for all the
periods during the year. In general terms it can be observed that
NTD data has higher values than TD data with similar
Additionally, from it can be observed that winds come from behavior. This is not consistent with the reported analysis in
east mainly (negative curves in Fig. 9), from the north (DJF other studies [8], and like what happen in pressure and
and MAM) and from the south (JJA and SON) in Fig. 10 temperature analysis, using t-student test, the main differences
curves. During JJA period, TD wind come from north between between both curves are mainly between 15:00 and 18:00
9:00 and 13:00 and then it changes its direction from south hours LT.

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Fig. 9, 10 and 11 show a very well influence of the Trade
Winds that brings a great amount of moisture to Colombia.
Moreover, Colombia is also affected by the Pacific
Intertropical Convergence Zone – ITCZ. The trade winds
come from northeast through Venezuela and the Caribbean
Sea, and from southeast through the Amazon Forest [10][11]. It
is also important to mention that Medellin is affected seriously
by “Chorro del Choco” that is a superficial wind stream that
comes from the Pacific Ocean and ascends through the
Western Cordillera of Colombia and coalesces with Trade
winds over Medellin causing thunderstorm formation [10].
Figure 9 Zonal wind for TD and NTD. The * indicate the statistically
significant differences at 95% level.
Figure 10 Meridional wind for TD and NTD. The * indicate the statistically
significant differences at 95% level.
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Figure 11 Wind magnitude (m/s) for TD and NTD.
IV. CONCLUSIONS
In this study, the mean diurnal cycle of different
meteorological variables over Medellin have been analyzed in
terms of lightning activity detected by a LINET.
Yearly, Medellin has a bimodal lightning activity with peaks
during the months of May and October. Medellin presents
highest lightning activity during MAM and SON.
Diurnal cycles of each period show that lightning activity is
predominant between 12:00 and 18:00 hours.
Pressure and temperature have an opposite behavior in
relation with lightning activity. In general terms, Pressure is
inversely proportional and Temperature is directly
proportional.
TD days are colder and more humid than NTD days and
have higher atmospheric pressure.
The differences are more evident during the afternoon.
Moreover, TD days show 1-2 hours earlier maximums (13-14
L) than NTD days.
Analyzing zonal and meridional wind direction, it can be
observed that it is predominant from northeast during morning
and afternoon time, nevertheless, during afternoon wind
direction is affected by some activity coming from southwest.
The trade winds coming from Northeast region bring
moisture from the Caribbean Sea and Venezuela to the Andes
Cordillera where Medellin City is located. Circulations from
the southeast also carry moisture from the Amazon forest to
Colombian cordilleras.
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