Application of Radar-Based Precipitation Data Improves the Effectiveness of Urban Inundation Forecasting

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Interesting article focusing on an innovative method of rain forecasting. The presented method showed promising results with reasonable accuracy.

Can the method be adapted to other urban areas?

What is the forecasting horizon? One hour, one day, ...?

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 1,

The authors would like to sincerely thanks the Editor-in-chief, Associated Editor and Reviewer # 1 for the time spent on reviewing the manuscript “Application of radar-based precipitation data improves the effectiveness of urban inundation forecasting”, (MS No. sustainability-2973410), and suggesting the positive comments. All suggestions have been incorporated in the revised manuscript and highlighted in red color. The manuscript is formatted as per the Sustainability Journal. The point-by-point response to all the comments is given in the author response form.

Best regards,

Doan Quang Tri

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

The study is well designed and implemented. And the results seem very effective since they aim to minimize the risk of such disastrous event.  

However, I am concerning about the following points and wish be addressed:

- Considering the prediction -based on radar data-, how exact will be determining the affected areas in advance?

- Is there any system connected to the emergency canal public warning for quick access of the people to the information in such vital moments?

- What are exact implications of this study regarding urban management policies in the context city?

- How might climate change (global warming) affect these prediction? Have you considered such factors?

- Do the floods always happen in the same locations in this city?

- How did you deal with the invisible rains in this study?

- How could your research contribute to such fast developing context and future constructions?   

- The Conclusion is to be re-written in a more precise manner.      

- The Title is to be re-written. 

Regards,  

- English grammatical checking is required. 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 2,

The authors would like to sincerely thanks the Editor-in-chief, Associated Editor and Reviewer # 2 for the time spent on reviewing the manuscript “Application of radar-based precipitation data improves the effectiveness of urban inundation forecasting”, (MS No. sustainability-2973410), and suggesting the positive comments. All suggestions have been incorporated in the revised manuscript and highlighted in red color. The manuscript is formatted as per the Sustainability Journal. The point-by-point response to all the comments is given in the author response form.

Best regards,

Doan Quang Tri

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

The manuscript itself seems quite descriptive / illustrative. Academic soundness and contribution of the manuscript seem disputable: is the "only" novelty of this work found in fact that it's addressing some specific geographical area? Or there's something more? If latter is the case - this should be outlined clearly. At this point, it seems like one case study where authors describe application of known sensors and models within a specific city / area. Which might be interesting, but lacks in scientific contribution. 

In addition to previously mentioned, authors should make improvements in following aspects also:

- technical preparation (numeration of Section 2. - not "2. 2.2", numbers in text without leading "0", Fig. 8-11 do not have proper description + text under figures doesn't have proper break, links in several references are not formatted as such,... etc.)

- figures should be addressed in text before they appear (see Fig. 1), all blocks should be described in text (see "CS - Control" block in Fig. 3 and belonging subsection), abbreviations should be defined (see "DEM" in page 10, "OBS" in Fig. 8, etc.)

- data should be correct and concise (see dates of events mentioned in page 10 and in Table 1 - this is different?)

- all interesting "discoveries" / results should be elaborated and explained (see reported QPE in Fig. 9c, and even more - reported QPF in Fig. 10c... this is quite interesting different from observed values, but isn't elaborated further... laconic note that "QPE and QPF are performing quite well" - doesn't seem to be resolving the issue).

Manuscript should be considered for eventual publication after revision in correspondence with given comments. 

Minor edits needed. For example: "In the future... results have been applied..." - kindly check the whole text once again and make corrections.  

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 3,

The authors would like to sincerely thanks the Editor-in-chief, Associated Editor and Reviewer # 3 for the time spent on reviewing the manuscript “Application of radar-based precipitation data improves the effectiveness of urban inundation forecasting”, (MS No. sustainability-2973410), and suggesting the positive comments. All suggestions have been incorporated in the revised manuscript and highlighted in red color. The manuscript is formatted as per the Sustainability Journal. The point-by-point response to all the comments is given in the author response form.

Best regards,

Doan Quang Tri

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Thanks for the corrections and responses. 

I am convinced with the new version. 

Regards, 

Author Response

Dear Sir/ Madam,

Thank you very much for reviewing the manuscript “Application of radar-based precipitation data improves the effectiveness of urban inundation forecasting”, (MS No. sustainability-2973410), and suggesting the comments to improve the quality of the manuscript submission.

Best regards,

Doan Quang Tri

Reviewer 3 Report

Authors did invest efforts in order to improve the paper. Still, my major concerns about the soundness and scientific contribution remain: in their response authors didn't provide further improvements on this issue. Thus, my main conclusion about the readiness for publication remain the same.

In addition, authors should also take care of:

- providing proper (in format and context), formal descriptions for Fig. 8-11 (i.e.: "Figure 8. Evaluating the QPE and QPF at Xuan Thuy station for three rainfall events: (a) Event 1, (b) Event 2, (c) Event 3." - under the figure, with following text of paragraph with proper break.)

- explanation of "extreme" values from my previous comment 4 (as numerated in table provided through authors' response), since only mention in text is not telling why those happened and what could be concluded further from these QPE / QPF values.   

Author Response

Dear Sir/Madam,

The authors would like to sincerely thanks the Editor-in-chief, Associated Editor and Reviewers # 3 for the time spent reviewing the manuscript “Application of radar-based precipitation data improves the effectiveness of urban inundation forecasting”, (MS No. sustainability-2973410), and suggesting the positive comments to improve the quality of the manuscript submission. All suggestions have been incorporated in the revised manuscript and highlighted in red color and green color. The manuscript is formatted as per the Sustainability Journal. The point-by-point response to all the comments is given the author response form in R2.

Best regards,

Doan Quang Tri

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 3

Reviewer 3 Report

Authors did provide technical improvements and (some) comments where they were asked for. Still, my main concern about the overall contribution of the paper still remains. However, since other reviewers do not emphasize this kind of doubt, I would not oppose publication of this manuscript. All the best in future work.