scholarly journals North Sea near-surface wind climate and its relation to the large-scale circulation patterns

2009 ◽  
Vol 99 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 403-419 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kay Sušelj ◽  
Abha Sood ◽  
Detlev Heinemann
2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leonie Villiger ◽  
Franziska Aemisegger ◽  
Maxi Boettcher ◽  
Heini Wernli

<p>In the tropical winter trades of the North Atlantic in the vicinity of Barbados four different mesoscale organisation patterns of clouds – sugar, gravel, flower, fish - are observed regularly. Each pattern is associated with a distinct cloud amount and radiative footprint. Therefore, the relative occurrence frequency of these patterns affects the global radiative budget. As shown by a recent study (Bony et al. 2019, Geophysical Research Letter), the occurrence of the four patterns is controlled by the near-surface wind speed and the strength of lower tropospheric instability. It is however not yet clear, whether these cloud patterns occur preferably in specific larger-scale flow configurations. These can be associated for example with upper-level wave breaking in the extratropics and different positions and strengths of low-level subtropical anticyclones.</p><p>Lower tropospheric air parcels at different altitudes in the trades are expected to have different transport histories associated with distinct diabatic processes such as radiative effects, phase changes within and below clouds and turbulent mixing. The diabatic processes encountered during transport modulate the thermodynamic properties of the air parcels and therefore influence the vertical thermodynamic structure of the atmosphere in the trades.</p><p>In this study, the impact of large-scale air mass advection on the thermodynamic profiles over Barbados is analysed for each of the four mesoscale organisation patterns observed during EUREC4A. The airmass transport history is characterised for different homogenous atmospheric layers. These layers are identified based on vertical pseudo-soundings above the Barbados Cloud Observatory (BCO) using ECMWF analysis data for cases where profiles agree well with independent observations from balloon soundings. The large-scale circulation within the 10 days prior to the sounding is considered for computing the trajectories of the air masses arriving in these layers. Backward trajectories are calculated with three-dimensional analysis wind fields. Thereby, the thermodynamic history and large-scale circulation configuration associated with the four cloud organisation patterns is described from a Lagrangian perspective. In addition, composites of the sea level pressure field provide information whether the four patterns co-occur with systematically differing positions and/or intensities of subtropical anticyclones. In future work, stable water isotopes will be used as observational tracers to find supportive evidence of the characterised transport history.</p>


Atmosphere ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (7) ◽  
pp. 745
Author(s):  
Carlos A. Ochoa-Moya ◽  
Yoel A. Cala-Pérez ◽  
Yanet Díaz-Esteban ◽  
Christopher L. Castro ◽  
Paulina Ordoñez-Peréz ◽  
...  

In this study, twenty large-scale circulation patterns are identified to generate a synoptic classification of Weather Types (WT) over a region that comprises Mexico, the Intra-Americas Seas, Central America, and northern South America. This classification is performed using Self-Organizing Maps (SOMs) with mean sea-level pressure standardized anomalies from reanalysis. The influence of quasi-permanent pressure centers over the region, such as North Atlantic Subtropical High (NASH) and North Pacific High (NPH) are well captured. Seasonal variability of high-pressure centers for dry (November–April) and wet (May–October) periods over the entire region are also well represented in amplitude and pattern among the WTs. The NASH influence and intensification of the Caribbean low-level jet and the North American monsoon system is well captured. During the dry period, a strong trough wind advects cold air masses from mid-latitudes to the subtropics over the western Atlantic Ocean. High-frequency transitions among WTs tend to cluster around the nearest neighbors in SOM space, while low-frequency transitions occur along columns instead of rows in the SOM matrix. Low-frequency transitions are related to intraseasonal and seasonal scales. The constructed catalog can identify near-surface atmospheric circulation patterns from a unified perspective of synoptic climate variability, and it is in high agreement with previous studies for the region.


2017 ◽  
Vol 102 ◽  
pp. 214-223 ◽  
Author(s):  
J.M. Correia ◽  
A. Bastos ◽  
M.C. Brito ◽  
R.M. Trigo

2007 ◽  
Vol 20 (22) ◽  
pp. 5553-5571 ◽  
Author(s):  
Masao Kanamitsu ◽  
Hideki Kanamaru

Abstract For the purpose of producing datasets for regional-scale climate change research and application, the NCEP–NCAR reanalysis for the period 1948–2005 was dynamically downscaled to hourly, 10-km resolution over California using the Regional Spectral Model. This is Part I of a two-part paper, describing the details of the downscaling system and comparing the downscaled analysis [California Reanalysis Downscaling at 10 km (CaRD10)] against observation and global analysis. An extensive validation of the downscaled analysis was performed using station observations, Higgins gridded precipitation analysis, and Precipitation-Elevation Regression on Independent Slopes Model (PRISM) precipitation analysis. In general, the CaRD10 near-surface wind and temperature fit better to regional-scale station observations than the NCEP–NCAR reanalysis used to force the regional model, supporting the premise that the regional downscaling is a viable method to attain regional detail from large-scale analysis. This advantage of CaRD10 was found on all time scales, ranging from hourly to decadal scales (i.e., from diurnal variation to multidecadal trend). Dynamically downscaled analysis provides ways to study various regional climate phenomena of different time scales because all produced variables are dynamically, physically, and hydrologically consistent. However, the CaRD10 is not free from problems. It suffers from positive bias in precipitation for heavy precipitation events. The CaRD10 is inaccurate near the lateral boundary where regional detail is damped by the lateral boundary relaxation. It is important to understand these limitations before the downscaled analysis is used for research.


2020 ◽  
Vol 212 ◽  
pp. 103456
Author(s):  
Kirstin Schulz ◽  
Karline Soetaert ◽  
Christian Mohn ◽  
Laura Korte ◽  
Furu Mienis ◽  
...  

2020 ◽  
Vol 35 (2) ◽  
pp. 367-377
Author(s):  
Hyun-Ju Lee ◽  
Woo-Seop Lee ◽  
Jong Ahn Chun ◽  
Hwa Woon Lee

Abstract Forecasting extreme events is important for having more time to prepare and mitigate high-impact events because those are expected to become more frequent, intense, and persistent around the globe in the future under the warming atmosphere. This study evaluates the probabilistic predictability of the heat wave index (HWI) associated with large-scale circulation patterns for predicting heat waves over South Korea. The HWI, reflecting heat waves over South Korea, was defined as the vorticity difference at 200 hPa between the South China Sea and northeast Asia. The forecast of up to 15 days from five ensemble prediction systems and the multimodel ensemble has been used to predict the probabilistic HWI during the summers of 2011–15. The ensemble prediction systems consist of different five operational centers, and the forecast skill of the probability of heat waves occurrence was assessed using the Brier skill score (BSS), relative operating characteristics (ROC), and reliability diagram. It was found that the multimodel ensemble is capable of better predicting the large-scale circulation patterns leading to heat waves over South Korea than any other single ensemble system through all forecast lead times. We concluded that the probabilistic forecast of the HWI has promise as a tool to take appropriate and timely actions to minimize the loss of lives and properties from imminent heat waves.


2011 ◽  
Vol 38 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 121-140 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jhan Carlo Espinoza ◽  
Matthieu Lengaigne ◽  
Josyane Ronchail ◽  
Serge Janicot

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Carmen Alvarez-Castro ◽  
Silvio Gualdi ◽  
Pascal Yiou ◽  
Mathieu Vrac ◽  
Robert Vautard ◽  
...  

<p>Windstorms, extreme precipitations and instant floods seems to strike the Mediterranean area with increasing frequency. These events occur simultaneously during intense tropical-like Mediterranean cyclones. These intense Mediterranean cyclones are frequently associated with wind, heavy precipitation and changes in temperature, generating high risk situations such as flash floods and large-scale floods with significant impacts on human life and built environment. Although the dynamics of these phenomena is well understood, little is know about their climatology. It is therefore very difficult to make statements about the frequency of occurrence and its response to climate change. Thus, intense Mediterranean cyclones have many different physical aspects that can not be captured by a simple standard approach. </p><p>The first challenge of this work is to provide an extended catalogue and climatology of these phenomena by reconstructing a database of intense Mediterranean cyclones dating back up to 1969 using the satellite, the literature and reanalyses. Applying a method based on dynamical systems theory we analyse and attribute their future changes under different anthropogenic forcings by using future simulations within CMIP framework. Preliminary results show a decrease of the large-scale circulation patterns favoring intense Mediterranean cyclones in all the seasons except summer.</p>


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hyunju Jung ◽  
Ann Kristin Naumann ◽  
Bjorn Stevens

<p>Convective self-aggregation in radiative convective equilibrium has been studied due to its similarities to organized convection in the tropics. As tropical atmospheric phenomena are embedded in a large-scale flow, we impose a background wind to the model setup using convection-permitting simulation to analyze the interaction of convective self-aggregation with the background wind. The simulations show that when imposing a background wind, the convective cluster propagates in the direction of the imposed wind but slows down compared to what pure advection would suggest, and eventually becomes stationary. The dynamic process dominates slowing down the propagation speed of the cluster because the surface momentum flux acts as a drag on the near-surface wind, terminating the propagation. The thermodynamic process through the wind-induce surface feedback contributes to only 6% of the propagation speed of the convective cluster and is strongly modified by the dynamic process.</p>


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document