Dear authors,

Both reviewers are quite critical about the work you submitted to HESS. They pose a number of serious questions regarding some of your basic assumptions concerning both the proposed rain rate retrieval technique as well as concerning the characteristics of the rainfall process itself. Notwithstanding the fact that one of the reviewers recommends rejection, I would like to give you the chance to significantly improve your manuscript and thereby convince both reviewers (and me) that it is worthy of publication in HESS. Please take all suggestions provided by the reviewers into account and respond to each of the issues raised on a point by point basis. A revised version of your manuscript will be sent out for review again.

Best regards,

Remko Uijlenhoet

Dear authors,

Thanks very much for your revised manuscript and your replies to the issues raised by the referees.

One of the referees is basically satisfied with your responses, but has a significant number of (mainly textual) changes that he / she wants to see implemented in the paper.

The other referee is not fully satisfied yet with the way in which you responded to the issues he / she raised, notably the way in which you dealt with the intermittency and non-stationarity of the rainfall fields in the geostatistical interpolation.

Finally, I suggest you implement the textual changes suggested by one referee and try to respond in more detail to the points raised by the other referee (you should include proposed changes to the text of the manuscript). Thanks in advance for your efforts.

Best regards,

Remko Uijlenhoet

Dear authors,

The reviewer has some minor remaining points that you may want to consider addressing in the final version of your manuscript, but they are not crucial. I am basically satisfied with the way you responded to the points raised by both reviewers. Therefore, I have decided to accept your paper "as is". Congratulations!

Best regards,

Remko Uijlenhoet