Lagrangian coherent structures along atmospheric rivers

Garaboa-Paz, Daniel; Eiras‐Barca, Jorge; Huhn, Florian; Pérez‐Muñuzuri, V.

doi:10.1063/1.4919768

Cited by 42 publications

(47 citation statements)

References 32 publications

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“…The climatological characteristics of ARs have been recently reviewed by Guan and Waliser (2015), who proved that they exhibit a mean length of about 3700 km and have average integrated vapor transport (IVT) fields of 375 kg m −1 s −1 . ARs are usually found in the warm sector of extratropical cyclones and are associated with the meridional transport of latent and sensible heat from the (sub)tropics to the midlatitudes (Newell et al, 1992;Zhu and Newell, 1998;Gimeno et al, 2010;Gimeno et al, 2014;Gimeno et al, 2016;Ralph and Dettinger, 2011;Lavers and Villarini, 2013;Matrosov, 2013;Neiman et al, 2013;Rutz et al, 2014;Garaboa-Paz et al, 2015;Waliser and Guan, 2017).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

On the relationship between atmospheric rivers, weather types and floods in Galicia (NW Spain)

Eiras‐Barca

Lorenzo

Taboada

et al. 2018

Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci.

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Abstract. Atmospheric rivers (ARs) -long and narrow structures of anomalously high water vapor flux located in the warm sector of extratropical cyclones -have been shown to be closely related to extreme precipitation and flooding. In this paper we analyze the connection between ARs and flooding in the northwestern Spanish region of Galicia under a variety of synoptic conditions represented by the so-called "weather types", a classification of daily sea-level pressure patterns obtained by means of a simple scheme that adopts the subjective procedure of Lamb. Flood events are identified from official reports conducted by the Spanish emergency management agency (Protección Civil) from 1979 to 2010. Our results suggest that, although most flood events in Galicia do not coincide with the presence of an overhead AR, ARs are present in the majority of severe cases, particularly in coastal areas. Flood events associated with ARs are connected to cyclonic weather types with westerly and southwesterly flows, which occur mostly in winter months. The link between ARs and severe flooding is not very apparent in inland areas or during summer months, in which case heavy precipitation is usually not frontal in nature but rather convective. Nevertheless, our results show that, in general, the amount of precipitation in flood events in Galicia more than doubles when an AR is present.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

On the relationship between atmospheric rivers, weather types and floods in Galicia (NW Spain)

Eiras‐Barca

Lorenzo

Taboada

et al. 2018

Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci.

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“…As the FTLE can be considered a measure of the large-scale tropospheric mixing (Garaboa-Paz et al, 2015), their role for JFM rainfall in the Iberian Peninsula has been considered. The values obtained for the spring (Fig.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Influence of finite-time Lyapunov exponents on winter precipitation over the Iberian Peninsula

Garaboa-Paz

Lorenzo

Pérez‐Muñuzuri

2017

Nonlin. Processes Geophys.

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Abstract. Seasonal forecasts have improved during the last decades, mostly due to an increase in understanding of the coupled ocean-atmosphere dynamics, and the development of models able to predict the atmosphere variability. Correlations between different teleconnection patterns and severe weather in different parts of the world are constantly evolving and changing. This paper evaluates the connection between winter precipitation over the Iberian Peninsula and the large-scale tropospheric mixing over the eastern Atlantic Ocean. Finite-time Lyapunov exponents (FTLEs) have been calculated from 1979 to 2008 to evaluate this mixing. Our study suggests that significant negative correlations exist between summer FTLE anomalies and winter precipitation over Portugal and Spain. To understand the mechanisms behind this correlation, summer anomalies of the FTLE have also been correlated with other climatic variables such as the sea surface temperature (SST), the sea level pressure (SLP) or the geopotential. The East Atlantic (EA) teleconnection index correlates with the summer FTLE anomalies, confirming their role as a seasonal predictor for winter precipitation over the Iberian Peninsula.

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“…In fact, the composite fields of air pressure at mean sea level (MSL) and Air temperature at 1000 hPa (T) are determinants of the rainfall patterns which typically occur in summer and winter in Agro‐Pontino Plain. Zonal & meridional wind at 850 hPa (UA‐VA) represents the atmospheric circulation configurations responsible of moisture transport and in particular the westward movement of winter storms originating over the Atlantic and impinging upon the western European coasts (Garaboa‐Paz, Eiras‐Barca, Huhn, & Pérez‐Muñuzuri, ). Precipitable water (P) from 10 to 1000 hPa, which is the atmosphere water vapor content in the atmospheric column, has spatial patterns highly coherent with the rainfall occurrence and amount associated to the different hidden states.…”

Section: Application To Agro‐pontino Plainmentioning

confidence: 99%

Large scale climate and rainfall seasonality in a Mediterranean Area: Insights from a non‐homogeneous Markov model applied to the Agro‐Pontino plain

Cioffi

Conticello

Lall

et al. 2016

Hydrological Processes

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In the context of climate change and variability, there is considerable interest in how large scale climate indicators influence regional precipitation occurrence and its seasonality. Seasonal and longer climate projections from coupled ocean-atmosphere models need to be downscaled to regional levels for hydrologic applications, and the identification of appropriate state variables from such models that can best inform this process is also of direct interest. Here, a Non-Homogeneous Hidden Markov Model (NHMM) for downscaling daily rainfall is developed for the Agro-Pontino Plain, a coastal reclamation region very vulnerable to changes of hydrological cycle. The NHMM, through a set of atmospheric predictors, provides the link between large scale meteorological features and local rainfall patterns. Atmospheric data from the NCEP/NCAR archive and 56-years record (1951-2004) of daily rainfall measurements from 7 stations in Agro-Pontino Plain are analyzed. A number of validation tests are carried out, in order to: 1) identify the best set of atmospheric predictors to model local rainfall; 2) evaluate the model performance to capture realistically relevant rainfall attributes as the inter-annual and seasonal variability, as well as average and extreme rainfall patterns. Validation tests show that the best set of atmospheric predictors are the following: mean sea level pressure, temperature at 1000 hPa, meridional and zonal wind at 850 hPa and precipitable water, from 20°N to 80°N of latitude and from 80°W to 60°E of longitude. Furthermore, the validation tests show that the rainfall attributes are simulated realistically and accurately. The capability of the NHMM to be used as a forecasting tool to quantify changes of rainfall patterns forced by alteration of atmospheric circulation under climate change and variability scenarios is discussed

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Lagrangian coherent structures along atmospheric rivers

Cited by 42 publications

References 32 publications

On the relationship between atmospheric rivers, weather types and floods in Galicia (NW Spain)

On the relationship between atmospheric rivers, weather types and floods in Galicia (NW Spain)

Influence of finite-time Lyapunov exponents on winter precipitation over the Iberian Peninsula

Large scale climate and rainfall seasonality in a Mediterranean Area: Insights from a non‐homogeneous Markov model applied to the Agro‐Pontino plain

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