Articles | Volume 18, issue 3
https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-18-2047-2026
© Author(s) 2026. This work is distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
StageIV-IRC: a high-resolution dataset of extreme orographic Quantitative Precipitation Estimates (QPE) constrained to water budget closure for historical floods in the Appalachian Mountains
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- Final revised paper (published on 20 Mar 2026)
- Preprint (discussion started on 19 Sep 2025)
Interactive discussion
Status: closed
Comment types: AC – author | RC – referee | CC – community | EC – editor | CEC – chief editor
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RC1: 'Comment on essd-2025-554', Anonymous Referee #1, 02 Oct 2025
- AC1: 'Reply on RC1', Mochi Liao, 24 Nov 2025
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RC2: 'Comment on essd-2025-554', Anonymous Referee #2, 21 Nov 2025
- AC2: 'Reply on RC2', Mochi Liao, 24 Nov 2025
Peer review completion
AR – Author's response | RR – Referee report | ED – Editor decision | EF – Editorial file upload
AR by Mochi Liao on behalf of the Authors (16 Jan 2026)
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ED: Referee Nomination & Report Request started (20 Jan 2026) by Di Tian
RR by Anonymous Referee #1 (20 Jan 2026)
RR by Brian Henn (07 Feb 2026)
ED: Reconsider after major revisions (08 Feb 2026) by Di Tian
AR by Mochi Liao on behalf of the Authors (11 Feb 2026)
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ED: Publish subject to minor revisions (review by editor) (12 Feb 2026) by Di Tian
AR by Mochi Liao on behalf of the Authors (16 Feb 2026)
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ED: Publish subject to minor revisions (review by editor) (16 Feb 2026) by Di Tian
AR by Mochi Liao on behalf of the Authors (16 Feb 2026)
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ED: Publish as is (17 Feb 2026) by Di Tian
AR by Mochi Liao on behalf of the Authors (28 Feb 2026)
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The author developed a High-resolution Dataset of Extreme Orographic QPE by closing the water budget using stream gauge measurements. This is a novel method and will be of great value if further validated. Therefore, I recommend a major revision, as some clarification is needed, and more dataset evaluation may be beneficial.
Major comments:
1. I would recommend that the authors mention ICC as well in the abstract, as it is also one step in the precipitation data generation.
2. I recommend that the author provide a brief code to show how to read the data. The current format and structure of the data are unclear. It will be helpful for readers to try the data.
3. Are the ICC and IRC corrections implemented simultaneously in windows 2 and 5? Intuitively, overestimated rainfall values can compensate for an underestimated initial soil moisture condition. I am curious whether this compensation causes some difficulties in determining precipitation.
4. In the inverse correction process, there are likely more unknowns (precipitation at each pixel) than the knowns (observed discharge). Is it possible to obtain two different precipitation fields that can generate very similar discharge? How can you guarantee that you can get the "optimal" precipitation fields compared to other possible realizations? Is it reasonable to obtain an ensemble precipitation dataset to account for this variability?
5. Why did the authors select Stage IV as the primary precipitation source? In the first step, the authors downscale the precipitation field from 4km to 1km. Other available precipitation datasets, such as MRMS and AORC, provide precipitation estimates at a 1km resolution. If the authors use these 1km datasets, the downscale step can be removed.
6. L201-204, what does "self-similar statistics" mean? In L213, what does "the same rainfall statistics" mean here? I am curious which type of rainfall statistics is preserved in the downscaling process.
7. What is the size of the rainfall field in Ordinary Kriging? Is it a basin-based correction? Ordinary Kriging has the assumption of geostationary, which may not perform optimally when applied to a large complex region.
8. L505-L508, the authors mentioned that "The climatologically corrected STIV_DBKC fields have a significantly accurate diurnal cycle compared to only event-scale bias-corrected STIV_DBK." But in Figure 5, I did not see many differences between the blue and green lines. And should not the "STIV_DBK" here be "STIV_DB"?
9. L610, the authors mentioned that "IRC-ICC" is the recommended dataset. In Section 5, the author provides the citation for "IRC". Why don't the authors publish IRC-ICC?
10. I recommend that the authors provide the results of STIV_IRC_ICC in Figures 5, 6, and 7. I understand that the lack of rainfall ground truth makes the evaluation of precipitation data a little bit hard. The better discharge estimates from your methods cannot reflect the absolute accuracy of precipitation data, as the discharge is your objective function. I would recommend more evaluation of the precipitation data itself. Alternatively, you can use STIV_IRC_ICC to drive another hydrologic model to evaluate whether you can also have a better discharge prediction than Stage IV. Model calibration can also be implemented, as hydrologists usually do so with a precipitation dataset.
Minor comments:
1. I recommend that the authors clarify the terminology usage. In Figure 2, the event scale bias correction is noted as STIV_BD. But in some places of the figure and the article, STIV_DBK is used.
2. L690. The resolution of StageIV_D is "1km, hourly" in Figure 1, but you mention " the same resolution as StageIV_D datasets (250m, 5min)".
3. Provide the legend in Figure A3, Figure 8,9, 11, 12
4. Provide the unit in Figure 10
5. Provide the y-axis in Figure 11