Momentum and heat transfer across the foam-covered air-sea interface in hurricanes

• Published in: Ocean dynamics 2020-05, Vol.70 (5), p.683-692
• Main Authors: Golbraikh, Ephim, Shtemler, Yuri M.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Atmospheric Sciences; Coefficients; Earth and Environmental Science; Earth Sciences; Enthalpy; Fluid- and Aerodynamics; Foams; Geophysics/Geodesy; Heat transfer; Hurricanes; Laboratories; Momentum; Monitoring/Environmental Analysis; Neutral stability; Oceanography; Roughness; Sea surface; Similarity theory; Wind speed
• ISSN: 1616-7341; 1616-7228
• DOI: 10.1007/s10236-020-01360-w

Procedures of formal averaging over the air-sea interface are applied to both momentum and enthalpy surface-transfer coefficients, C D and C K , in hurricane conditions. The transfer coefficients across the total area of the sea surface and water-covered portions of the sea surface, C D , C K , and C Dw , C Kw , are estimated by measurements in the open-sea and laboratory (foam-free) conditions, respectively, while the transfer coefficients across the foam-covered portion of the sea surface, C Df , Kf , which cannot be measured directly, are estimated using the splitting relations. Applying the Monin-Obukhov similarity theory at the neutral stability atmospheric conditions to the transfer coefficients (separately for the foam-free, foam-covered, and total sea surfaces) yields the roughness lengths Z Dw ,  Z Kw , Z Df ,  Z Kf , and Z D , Z K . The study is aimed at the description of an anomalous, as compared with laboratory conditions, behavior of the momentum and enthalpy transfer coefficients in hurricane conditions with wind speed U 10 by the effect of the foam slipping layer sandwiched between the atmosphere and the ocean.