Question Bank

(From university Question Papers)

Unit I:
A) Introduction to Hydrology, B) Precipitation: Forms,
C) Evaporation and Infiltration, D) Stream Gauging

1. How hydrology is interdisciplinary science
2. Define hydrology and discuss its importance in the planning of water resources projects
3. Explain with neat sketch Hydrological cycle. State the different process involved in it.
4. Define precipitation. State any six forms of precipitation. Also explain 3 types of
precipitation
5. State conditions of raining. Explain cyclonic & orographic precipitation.
6. Differentiate between:
i) Tropical cyclone and extratropical cyclone
ii) Convective precipitation and orographic precipitation
7. State any three types of rain gauges. Explain any one of them in detail with a neat sketch.
8. Differentiate between:
i) Symons rain gauge and weighing bucket rain gauge
ii) Mass curve of rainfall and hyetograph
iii) Frontal precipitation and non-frontal precipitation
9. Describe tipping bucket type rainfall measurement. Mention its advantages and
disadvantages. Explain telemetry.
10. Explain with neat and labeled figure weighing bucket type of rain gauge.
11. Describe principles of rainfall measurement using RADAR with neat sketch, also state its
advantages over other rain gauges.
12. Explain any three methods of determining average rainfall over a catchment. State their
advantages and limitations.
13. In a catchment area of 100 Km
2
the average annual precipitation observed at a five rain
gauge station was
station A B C D E
Ann. Av. Ppt (mm) 750 1000 900 650 500
If permissible error is 10% determine
i) Number of additional rain gauge stations required
ii) Rain gauge density
14. The isohyets due to a storm were having following details:
Isohyets (mm) Area (Km
2
)
150 40
170-150 150
150-140 70
140-130 200
130-110 25
Find the weighted precipitation for the total catchment area.
15. The data from an isohyetal map of catchment is shown in the following table
Isohyet (mm) 250 300 350 400 450 500
Area covered by Isohyet (km
2
) 500 400 300 200 100 -

Determine the average depth of precipitation over the catchment area of 5000km
2
.
16. Explain how you will calculate missing rainfall data at station. State rainfall density as
per WHO standards.
17. The normal annual precipitation of five rain gauge stations P, Q, R, S and T are
respectively 125, 102, 76, 113 and 137 cm. During a particular storm the precipitation
recorded by stations P, Q, R and S are 13.2, 9.2, 6.8 and 10.2 respectively. The
instrument at station T was inoperative during the storm. Estimate the rainfall at station T
during that storm by normal ratio method.
18. The rain gauge station X did not function for a part of month during which a storm
occurred. The storm produced rainfalls of 84, 70 and 96 mm at three surrounding stations
A, b and C respectively. The normal annual rainfalls at the stations X, A, B and C
respectively 770, 882, 736 and 944 mm. Estimate the missing storm at station X.
19. A catchment area has seven rain gauge stations. In a year the annual rainfall recorded by
the gauges are as follows:
Station P Q R S T U V
Rainfall (cm) 130 142.1 118.2 108.5 165.2 102.1 146.9
For a 5% error in the estimation of mean rainfall. Calculate the minimum number of
additional stations required to be established in the catchment.
20. In a catchment area covering 100 sq.km the average annual precipitation observed at five
rain gauge stations is given as follows. Find the number of additional rain gauge stations
required if the permissible error is 10%
Station 1 2 3 4 5
Precipitation (cm) 75 100 90 65 50
21. What are the WHO recommendations for density of rain gauge network. Based on this
are the recommendations by Indian Standard (IS: 8389-1983)?
22. Describe the working of a float type recording rain gauge with neat sketch. Mention its
advantages over non-recording type.
23. The hourly precipitation data during a storm is as follows
Time (Hrs.) 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Precipitation (mm) 0 10 30 25 50 5 10 10 25 20 0
Plot for above data.
i) Hyetograph
ii) Mass curve
24. The hourly precipitation data during a storm is as follows:
Time (Hrs.) 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16
Precipitation (mm) 0 25 5 10 25 15 10 5 0
Plot for above data.
i) Hyetograph
ii) Mass curve
25. Sate various methods of determination of the mean precipitation over a given catchment
area. Explain giving neat sketches any two methods.
26. For a catchment area of 500 sqkm following data are available. Estimate the average
precipitation over the catchment area.
Isohyets in mm 900-1000 800-900 700-800 600-700 500-600
Area between successive
isohyets in sqkm
90 100 125 40 45
27. Explain the following with case:
i) Mass rainfall curve
ii) Double mass curve
iii) A rain gauge recorded the following accumulated rainfall during the storm. Draw
the mass rainfall curve along the hyetograph.
Time (am) 8:00 8:05 8:10 8:15 8:20 8:25 8:30
Accumulated
rainfall (mm)
0 1 2 6 13 18 19
28. What is meant by probable maximum precipitation? Describe the methods of estimating
PMP. What are its design applications?
29. Explain with the graph the Intensity Duration-frequency relationship.
30. What are the design applications of the depth area duration relation? Explain the
procedure for developing these relations
31. Compute and draw DAD curve, and find the average depth of precipitation that may be
expected over an area of 2400 sqkm, due to the specific storm which lasted for 24 hours.
Assume the storm center to be labeled at the center of the area. The isohytel map for the
storm gave the areas enclosed between different isohyets as follows:
Isohyets (mm) Enclosed Area (Sq.km.)
21 543
20 1345
19 2030
18 2545
17 2955
16 3280
15 3535
14 3710
13 3880
12 3915
32. Differentiate between Evaporation and evapotranspiration. State any five factors affecting
evaporation. State Daltons equation.
33. Define infiltration. State factors affecting infiltration. State Hortons equation for
infiltration
34. What are 3 analytical methods of evaporation estimation? Explain any one of them.
35. State any 3 methods of reducing evaporation and explain any one of them.
36. State any four factors affecting evaporation. Also, state any four measures to control the
evaporation.
37. Give analogy for infiltration with help of sketch and thereby differentiate between
infiltration capacity and field capacity.
38. Explain how evapotranspiration is measured with help of:
i) Lysimeters
ii) Filed plot method
39. Explain the following methods of measurement of evaporation:
i) By evaporimeters
ii) By analytical methods
40. Explain working of infiltrometers
41. What is evaporation? How will you measure it? Draw a neat labeled sketch of field
method to measure evaporation. State methods to control evaporation loss from reservoir.
Explain ant one method in detail
42. What is evapotranspiration? How will you measure it? Draw neat labeled sketch of filed
method to measure evapotranspiration. State methods to control evaporation loss from
reservoir. Explain any one method in detail.
43. State various methods to measure evaporation. Discuss the factors affecting infiltration.
Explain flooding type infiltrometer.
44. State any 3 direct methods of measuring stream flow. Explain any one of them
45. What is stream gauging? Explain dilution technique method with sketch and explain its
application in water resource engineering.
46. What is stream gauging? Explain area-velocity method with sketch and explain its
application in water resources engineering.
47. Explain with neat sketch, the current meter method of determining the discharge flow
through open channel. Also, state the equation of current meter.
48. Runoff from a catchment area 150 sqkm was 9.0 /Mm
3
. Rainfall in the area was observed
as below. Determine the rate on infiltration
Time (hour) 0 1 2 3 4 5 6
Rainfall (mm) 0 16 19 26 41 21 11
49. Calculate the value of index from the following data of storm of 10 cm precipitation
that resulted in a direct runoff 4.6 cm
Time in hours 1 2 3 4 5 6
Incremental rainfall
per hour in cms
0.55 0.60 1.25 3.00 1.50 1.20
50. Explain infiltration indices with a suitable sketch
51. The mass curve of rainfall of duration 100 mm is given below. If the catchment has a
index of 0.6 cm/h, calculate the total surface runoff from the catchment.
Time for the start of the
rainfall (min.)
0 20 40 60 80 100
Cumulative rainfall (cm) 0 0.5 1.2 2.6 3.3 3.5