FREE: Historical UK Rainfall Depth Maxima and Maps

Rainfall depth maxima data and maps for extreme events across the UK, digitized from the paper British Rainfall publication. The collection provides a long-term record dating back to at least 1860, intended for improving flood risk models and predictions. This dataset was created as part of a NERC-funded research project led by the University of Oxford.

Use Cases

• Calibrating flood risk models based on historical extreme rainfall patterns.
• Analyzing trends in extreme rainfall events over a century-long time range.
• Validating statistical and supercomputer-based weather ensemble predictions for precipitation.
• Studying the specific rainfall patterns behind historical flood events like Boscastle (2004) and Lynmouth (1952).

Strengths

• Provides a digitized historical record with data dating back to at least 1860.
• Includes associated description documents and geospatial rainfall maps of extreme events.
• Archived for community access, indicating curation and preservation.

Limitations

• Column names and detailed schema are unknown, limiting precise understanding of data structure.
• The exact temporal endpoint is unclear, with descriptions mentioning 'up to 1968' but the project running from 2007-2008.
• Key metadata such as dataset size, row count, and specific author are not provided.

Provenance

Source

Digitized from the paper version of the British Rainfall publication, archived at the BADC (British Atmospheric Data Centre).

Collection Method

Digitization of paper records as part of the NERC Flood Risk for Extreme Events (FREE) Research Programme project NE/E002013/1.

Time Range

1860 to approximately 1968

Freshness

2026-07-08 13:32:59.853280

Geography

United Kingdom