The Impact of the Amazon–Orinoco River Plume on Enthalpy Flux and Air–Sea Interaction within Caribbean Sea Tropical Cyclones

• Published in: Monthly weather review 2019-03, Vol.147 (3), p.931-950
• Main Authors: Rudzin, Johna E., Shay, Lynn K., Jaimes de la Cruz, Benjamin
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Air; Air-sea flux; Air-sea interaction; Boundary conditions; Boundary layers; Climatology; Cooling; Cyclones; Depth indicators; Enthalpy; Entrainment; Equivalent potential temperature; Estimates; Fluctuations; Global positioning systems; GPS; Heat; Heat budget; Heat content; Heat flux; Heat transfer; Humidity; Hurricanes; Induction heating; Inspection; Isothermal layers; Laboratories; Ocean temperature; Oceans; Potential temperature; Remote sensing systems; River plumes; Rivers; Salinity; Sea surface; Sea surface cooling; Sea surface temperature; Sensible heat; Sensible heat flux; Sensible heat transfer; Software; Storms; Stratification; Studies; Surface cooling; Surface fluxes; Surface temperature; Thermocline; Tropical climate; Tropical cyclone intensities; Tropical cyclones; Wind; Wind shear
• ISSN: 0027-0644; 1520-0493
• DOI: 10.1175/MWR-D-18-0295.1

The influence of the Amazon–Orinoco River plume in the Caribbean Sea on latent and sensible heat flux (enthalpy flux) and tropical cyclone (TC) intensity is investigated for Hurricanes Ivan (2004), Emily (2005), Dean (2007), and Felix (2007) using dropwindsonde data, satellite sea surface temperature (SST), and the SMARTS climatology. Relationships among enthalpy fluxes, ocean heat content relative to the 26°C isotherm depth (OHC), and SST during storm passage are diagnosed. Results indicate that sea surface cooling in the river plume, a low-OHC region, is comparable to that in the warm eddy region, which has high OHC. An isothermal layer heat budget shows that upper-ocean cooling in the river plume can be explained predominantly by sea-to-air heat flux, rather than by entrainment flux from the thermocline. The latter two findings suggest that relatively large upper-ocean stratification in the plume regime limited entrainment cooling, sustaining SST and enthalpy flux. Inspection of atmospheric variables indicates that deep moderate wind shear is prevalent, and equivalent potential temperature is enhanced over the river plume region for most of these storms. Thus, sustained surface fluxes in this region may have provided warm, moist boundary layer conditions, which may have helped these storms to rapidly intensify even over relatively low-OHC waters and moderate shear. These findings are important because several Caribbean Sea TCs, including these cases, have been underforecast with respect to intensity and/or rapid intensifications, yet minimal upper-ocean observations exist to understand air–sea interaction during TCs in the salinity-stratified Amazon–Orinoco plume regime.