Analysis of spatial correlation structure exhibited by daily rainfall in Southern Italy

The investigation of the spatial correlation structure exhibited by ground-based rainfall measurements can provide useful results for understanding, from a climatic point of view, the effects produced by the interaction between meteorological patterns and morphological features of a given territory. The central aspect of this study is the description of the spatial inhomogeneity and anisotropy that characterizes the correlation structure of daily rainfall. In the proposed approach, the analysis is developed by assuming that the correlation structure exhibited by the rainfall heights can be interpreted through a suitable deformation of the spatial coordinates providing a homogeneous and isotropic field. The technique has been applied to the daily rainfall recorded at the rain gauges network of the Crati River basin (Southern Italy). The results show that the elliptic deformations of the spatial structure exhibited by the correlation structure of the rain gauges are closely related to the physiographic features of the territory.