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Atmosphere
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Tropical Cyclone Evolution: Changes in Structure, Intensity, and Environmental Interactions
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Tropical Cyclone Evolution: Changes in Structure, Intensity, and Environmental Interactions

A special issue of Atmosphere (ISSN 2073-4433). This special issue belongs to the section "Meteorology".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (28 February 2022) | Viewed by 16685

Special Issue Editor

Dr. Joshua Cossuth

E-Mail
Guest Editor
Office of Naval Research, Arlington, VA 22217, USA
Interests: tropical cyclones; satellite meteorology; marine meteorology; weather forecasting; numerical weather prediction

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Tropical cyclones endure as a weather phenomenon of high interest, despite remarkable progress in characterizing and predicting them since the 1940s. Their impact on society is notorious, needing no new introduction. As such, tropical cyclone research continues, focusing on understanding the aspects of their meteorology that drive or alter them. These analyses happen via in situ field observations, remote sensing from all types of platforms, and numerical modeling experiments from operational and research systems.

This call targets the phenomenology of tropical cyclones as it relates to better discerning how and why they change. Aspects of change in the state of tropical cyclone structure, strength, movement, and/or environmental interaction are the cause of error in forecasting and belie the completeness of our scientific understanding. Analyses of tropical cyclone data to understand how changes in tropical cyclone character occur enable a greater understanding into their nature and foster an enhanced capability to predict their evolution.

Contributions to this Special Issue can apply to tropical cyclone case studies through climatologies, regionally or globally, from synoptic scales through small physics scales. Analyses may include (1) global or mesoscale numerical weather prediction systems, (2) field campaign studies, (3) satellite, air, sea, or ground base observing, and/or (4) other idealized, statistical, or historical data. Overall, manuscripts in this collection should convey scientific insight into some aspect of tropical cyclone evolution, providing a better understanding of why a change in their nature occurs.

Dr. Joshua Cossuth
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

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Keywords

  • Tropical cyclones
  • Hurricanes
  • Eyewall replacement cycle
  • Wind radii
  • Intensity change
  • Rapid intensification
  • Wind shear
  • Outflow

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Published Papers (7 papers)

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Research

30 pages, 5349 KiB  
Article
Critical Pre-Formation Decision Flowchart to Apply Tropical Cyclone Lifecycle Predictions in Eastern North Pacific
by Russell L. Elsberry, Hsiao-Chung Tsai, Corie Capalbo, Wei-Chia Chin and Timothy P. Marchok
Atmosphere 2023, 14(4), 616; https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos14040616 - 24 Mar 2023
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 1418
Abstract
We have previously demonstrated that the ECMWF ensemble (ECEPS) provides early forecasts not only of the Time-to-Tropical Storm (T2TS) and of the Time-to-Hurricane (T2HU), but also of the Time-Ending-Hurricane (TEHU) and Time-Ending-Tropical Storm (TETS) times and positions along those 15-day ECEPS track forecasts, [...] Read more.
We have previously demonstrated that the ECMWF ensemble (ECEPS) provides early forecasts not only of the Time-to-Tropical Storm (T2TS) and of the Time-to-Hurricane (T2HU), but also of the Time-Ending-Hurricane (TEHU) and Time-Ending-Tropical Storm (TETS) times and positions along those 15-day ECEPS track forecasts, which then provides an opportunity for high-wind warnings along the path during the entire lifecycle of these Hurricanes. The focus in this study is the Decision Flowchart that has been developed to assist the forecasters to select the pre-formation disturbance that is most likely to become the next Tropical Storm with the potential to become a Hurricane. The most crucial decision is to detect and eliminate any disturbance that likely originated from a precursor Caribbean false alarm circulation. Summaries of other steps in the Decision Flowchart “To Watch”, or to reject, other storm options in the twice-daily ECEPS forecasts are provided for Hurricanes Enrique and Felicia, and for strong Tropical Storm Guillermo and weak Tropical Storm Jimena. The first detections in the ECEPS forecasts for the Tropical Storms during the 2021 season averaged 6 days, 18 h in advance with a range of only 2 days, 6 h in advance for TS Terry to 9 days, 18 h in advance for TS Sandra. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Tropical Cyclone Evolution: Changes in Structure, Intensity, and Environmental Interactions)
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35 pages, 12656 KiB  
Article
Opportunity for Tropical Cyclone Lifecycle Predictions from Pre-Formation to Ending Stage: Eastern North Pacific 2021 Season
by Russell L. Elsberry, Hsiao-Chung Tsai, Corie Capalbo, Wei-Chia Chin and Timothy P. Marchok
Atmosphere 2022, 13(7), 1008; https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos13071008 - 22 Jun 2022
Cited by 4 | Viewed by 1570
Abstract
Building on previous studies of western North Pacific formation and intensity predictions along the ECMWF ensemble medium-range track forecasts, the first objective of this transition to the eastern North Pacific was to provide earlier forecasts of the Time-to-Formation (T2F) and Time-to-Hurricane (T2H) than [...] Read more.
Building on previous studies of western North Pacific formation and intensity predictions along the ECMWF ensemble medium-range track forecasts, the first objective of this transition to the eastern North Pacific was to provide earlier forecasts of the Time-to-Formation (T2F) and Time-to-Hurricane (T2H) than are available from the National Hurricane Center Advisories. For the first six hurricanes of the 2021 season, the first detections in the ECMWF ensemble were 8 days to 12 days in advance of the T2F times and 9 days to 13 days in advance of the T2H times. The major advance in this study has been to document that the ECMWF ensemble is also capable of predicting Ending-T2H and Ending-T2F timings and positions along those 15-day ECMWF ensemble track forecasts. This study for the first time documents the opportunity for high wind warnings during the entire lifecycle of the 2021 season hurricanes even days in advance of formation. Validations of the pre-hurricane and Ending-hurricane tracks and timings are provided for the lifecycles of seven hurricanes and the “Almost-Hurricane Guillermo”. Because the technique has been accepted for operational testing at the Joint Typhoon Warning Center, a companion article has been submitted that will describe the flowchart methodology for evaluating the twice-daily ECMWF ensemble forecasts to select the most likely pre-hurricane circulation as early as possible while non-selecting the likely false alarm circulations. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Tropical Cyclone Evolution: Changes in Structure, Intensity, and Environmental Interactions)
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17 pages, 6718 KiB  
Article
Exploring the Impact of Planetary Boundary Layer Schemes on Rainfall Forecasts for Typhoon Mujigae, 2015
by Wenqi Shen, Zebin Lu, Guilin Ye, Yu Zhang, Siqi Chen and Jianjun Xu
Atmosphere 2022, 13(2), 220; https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos13020220 - 28 Jan 2022
Cited by 6 | Viewed by 2386
Abstract
Sensitivity experiments were conducted on Typhoon Mujigae, which occurred in 2015, wherein the Weather Research and Forecasting Advanced Research (WRF-ARW) model was used to select two local and two nonlocal planetary boundary layer (PBL) parameterization schemes: the quasi-normal scale elimination (QNSE) and Mellor–Yamada–Janjic [...] Read more.
Sensitivity experiments were conducted on Typhoon Mujigae, which occurred in 2015, wherein the Weather Research and Forecasting Advanced Research (WRF-ARW) model was used to select two local and two nonlocal planetary boundary layer (PBL) parameterization schemes: the quasi-normal scale elimination (QNSE) and Mellor–Yamada–Janjic (MYJ) schemes, and the Yonsei University (YSU) and medium-range forecast (MRF) schemes, respectively. The differences in rainfall response in the typhoon’s inner core and outer region were evaluated by comparing the anomaly rainfall distribution, heat transmission, and mixing processes in the boundary layer among the PBL schemes. The results show that the simulated rainfall in typhoon Mujigae has large uncertainty among the PBL schemes and a significant difference between the inner and outer regions. Compared with the observation, the simulated rainfall was significantly higher in the inner core and slightly lower in the outer region. All PBL schemes accurately identified the rainfall location, although the amounts differed between the schemes. The rainfall levels in the MRF scheme were closest to the observation, followed by those in the YSU and MYJ schemes; the QNSE scheme showed the largest deviation. In general, rainfall simulation using a nonlocal boundary layer scheme such as MRF had the best results for both the inner core and the outer region. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Tropical Cyclone Evolution: Changes in Structure, Intensity, and Environmental Interactions)
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13 pages, 1555 KiB  
Article
Wind Speed Analysis of Hurricane Sandy
by Pablo Martínez, Isidro A. Pérez, María Luisa Sánchez, María de los Ángeles García and Nuria Pardo
Atmosphere 2021, 12(11), 1480; https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos12111480 - 9 Nov 2021
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 2699
Abstract
The database of the HWind project sponsored by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) for hurricanes between 1994 and 2013 is analysed. This is the first objective of the current research. Among these hurricanes, Hurricane Sandy was selected for a detailed study [...] Read more.
The database of the HWind project sponsored by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) for hurricanes between 1994 and 2013 is analysed. This is the first objective of the current research. Among these hurricanes, Hurricane Sandy was selected for a detailed study due to the number of files available and its social relevance, with this being the second objective of this study. Robust wind speed statistics showed a sharp increase in wind speed, around 6 m s−1 at the initial stage as Category 1, and a linear progression of its interquartile range, which increased at a rate of 0.54 m s−1 per day. Wind speed distributions were initially right-skewed. However, they evolved to nearly symmetrical or even left-skewed distributions. Robust kurtosis was similar to that of the Gaussian distribution. Due to the noticeable fraction of wind speed intermediate values, the Laplace distribution was used, its scale parameter increasing slightly during the hurricane’s lifecycle. The key features of the current study were the surface and recirculation factor calculation. The surface area with a category equal to, or higher than, a tropical storm was calculated and assumed to be circular. Its radius increased linearly up to 600 km. Finally, parcel trajectories were spirals in the lower atmosphere but loops in the mid-troposphere due to wind translation and rotation. The recirculation factor varied, reaching values close to 0.9 and revealing atmospheric stratification. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Tropical Cyclone Evolution: Changes in Structure, Intensity, and Environmental Interactions)
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25 pages, 6298 KiB  
Article
Model Sensitivity Study of the Direct Radiative Impact of Saharan Dust on the Early Stage of Hurricane Earl
by Jianyu Liang, Yongsheng Chen, Avelino F. Arellano and Abdulla Al Mamun
Atmosphere 2021, 12(9), 1181; https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos12091181 - 13 Sep 2021
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 2391
Abstract
Current studies report inconsistent results about the impacts of Saharan dust on the development of African Easterly Waves (AEWs), the African Easterly Jet (AEJ), and tropical cyclones (TCs). We present a modeling case study to further elucidate the direct radiative impacts of dust [...] Read more.
Current studies report inconsistent results about the impacts of Saharan dust on the development of African Easterly Waves (AEWs), the African Easterly Jet (AEJ), and tropical cyclones (TCs). We present a modeling case study to further elucidate the direct radiative impacts of dust on the early development stage of a TC. We conducted experiments using the Weather Research and Forecasting model coupled with chemistry (WRF-Chem-V3.9.1) to simulate Hurricane Earl (2010) which was influenced by the dusty Saharan Air Layer (SAL). We used the aerosol product from ECMWF MACC-II as the initial and boundary conditions to represent aerosol distribution, along with typical model treatment of its radiative and microphysical effects in WRF. Our simulations at 36-km resolution show that, within the first 36 h, the presence of dust weakens the low-pressure system over North Africa by less than 1 hPa and reduces its mean temperature by 0.03 K. Dust weakens and intensifies the AEJ at its core and periphery, respectively, with magnitudes less than 0.2 m/s. Dust slightly shifts the position of 600 hPa AEW to the south and reduces its intensity prior to impacting the TC. Finally, TC with dust remains weaker. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Tropical Cyclone Evolution: Changes in Structure, Intensity, and Environmental Interactions)
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21 pages, 11770 KiB  
Article
An Observational Study of Aerosols and Tropical Cyclones over the Eastern Atlantic Ocean Basin for Recent Hurricane Seasons
by Mohin Patel, Sen Chiao and Qian Tan
Atmosphere 2021, 12(8), 1036; https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos12081036 - 13 Aug 2021
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 2322
Abstract
The aerosol vertical distribution in the tropical cyclone (TC) main development region (MDR) during the recent active hurricane seasons (2015–2018) was investigated using observations from NASA’s Cloud-Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observations (CALIPSO) Satellite. The Total Attenuated Backscatter (TAB) at 532 nm [...] Read more.
The aerosol vertical distribution in the tropical cyclone (TC) main development region (MDR) during the recent active hurricane seasons (2015–2018) was investigated using observations from NASA’s Cloud-Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observations (CALIPSO) Satellite. The Total Attenuated Backscatter (TAB) at 532 nm was measured by the Cloud-Aerosol Lidar with Orthogonal Polarization (CALIOP Lidar) onboard CALIPSO which is a polar orbiting satellite that evaluates the role clouds and atmospheric aerosols play in Earth’s weather, climate and air quality. The TAB was used to illustrate the dispersion and magnitude of the aerosol vertical distribution in the TC-genesis region. A combination of extinction quality flag, cloud fraction, and cloud-aerosol discrimination (CAD) scores were used to filter out the impact of clouds. To better describe the qualitative and quantitative difference of aerosol along the paths of African Easterly Waves (AEWs), the MDR was further divided into two domains from 18° W to 30° W (Domain 1) and 30° W to 45° W (Domain 2), respectively. The distribution of average aerosol concentration from the time of active cyclogenesis was compared and quantified between each case. The resulting observations suggest that there are two distinct layers of aerosols in the vertical profile, a near surface layer from 0.5–1.75 km and an upper layer at 1.75–5 km in altitude. A quantification of the total aerosol concentration values indicate domain 2 cases were associated with higher aerosol concentrations than domain 1 cases. The environmental variables such as sea surface temperature (SST), vertical windshear (VWS), and relative humidity (RH) tended to be favorable for genesis to occur. Among all cases in this study, the results suggested tropical cyclone genesis and further development occurred under dust-loaded conditions while the environmental variables were favorable, indicating that dust aerosols may not play a significant role in inhibiting the genesis process of TCs. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Tropical Cyclone Evolution: Changes in Structure, Intensity, and Environmental Interactions)
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25 pages, 55214 KiB  
Article
Predicting Rapid Intensification Events Following Tropical Cyclone Formation in the Western North Pacific Based on ECMWF Ensemble Warm Core Evolutions
by Russell L. Elsberry, Hsiao-Chung Tsai, Wei-Chia Chin and Timothy P. Marchok
Atmosphere 2021, 12(7), 847; https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos12070847 - 29 Jun 2021
Cited by 6 | Viewed by 2437
Abstract
When the environmental conditions over the western North Pacific are favorable for tropical cyclone formation, a rapid intensification event will frequently follow formation. In this extension of our combined three-stage 7-day Weighted Analog Intensity Pacific prediction technique, the European Centre for Medium-range Weather [...] Read more.
When the environmental conditions over the western North Pacific are favorable for tropical cyclone formation, a rapid intensification event will frequently follow formation. In this extension of our combined three-stage 7-day Weighted Analog Intensity Pacific prediction technique, the European Centre for Medium-range Weather Prediction ensemble predictions of the warm core magnitudes of pre-tropical cyclone circulations are utilized to define the Time-to-Formation (35 knots) and to estimate the Likely Storm Category. If that category is a Typhoon, the bifurcation version of our technique is modified to better predict the peak intensity by selecting only Cluster 1 analog storms with the largest peak intensities that are most likely to have under-gone rapid intensification. A second modification to improve the peak intensity magnitude and timing was to fit a cubic spline curve through the weighted-mean peak intensities of the Cluster 1 analogs. The performance of this modified technique has been evaluated for a sequence of western North Pacific tropical cyclones during 2019 in terms of: (i) Detection time in advance of formation; (ii) Accuracy of Time-to-Formation; (iii) Intensification stage prediction; and (iv) Peak intensity magnitude/timing. This modified technique would provide earlier guidance as to the threat of a Typhoon along the 15-day ensemble storm track forecast, which would be a benefit for risk management officials. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Tropical Cyclone Evolution: Changes in Structure, Intensity, and Environmental Interactions)
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