Importance of Air-Sea Coupling in Simulating Tropical Cyclone Intensity at Landfall

An atmosphere-only model system for making seasonal prediction and projecting future intensities of landfalling tropical cyclones (TCs) along the South China coast is upgraded by including ocean and wave models. A total of 642 TCs have been re-simulated using the new system to produce a climatology...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Advances in atmospheric sciences 2022-10, Vol.39 (10), p.1777-1786
Main Authors: Lok, Charlie C. F., Chan, Johnny C. L., Toumi, Ralf
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Air-sea coupling
Atmosphere
Atmospheric models
Atmospheric Sciences
Bathymetry
Climate Change and Variability of Tropical Cyclone Activity
Climatology
Cyclones
Earth and Environmental Science
Earth Sciences
Geophysics/Geodesy
Hurricanes
Meteorology
Modelling
Notes & Letters
Ocean models
Oceans
Sea surface
Sea surface temperature
Simulation
Surface temperature
Tropical cyclone intensities
Tropical cyclones
Wave models
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Summary:An atmosphere-only model system for making seasonal prediction and projecting future intensities of landfalling tropical cyclones (TCs) along the South China coast is upgraded by including ocean and wave models. A total of 642 TCs have been re-simulated using the new system to produce a climatology of TC intensity in the South China Sea. Detailed comparisons of the simulations from the atmosphere-only and the fully coupled systems reveal that the inclusion of the additional ocean and wave models enable differential sea surface temperature responses to various TC characteristics such as translational speed and size. In particular, interaction with the ocean does not necessarily imply a weakening of the TC, with the coastal bathymetry possibly playing a role in causing a near-shore intensification of the TC. These results suggest that to simulate the evolution of TC structure more accurately, it is essential to use an air-sea coupled model instead of an atmosphere-only model.
ISSN:0256-1530
1861-9533
DOI:10.1007/s00376-022-1326-9