Revealing the Subsurface Yellow Sea Cold Water Mass from Satellite Data Associated with Typhoon Muifa

Abstract

A significant sea surface temperature (SST) drop was clearly identified to be confined exactly over the Yellow Sea Cold Water Mass (YSCWM) from satellite‐derived SSTs during Typhoon Muifa's passage over the Yellow Sea (YS) in early August 2011. With a simple one‐dimensional mixed‐layer model (Price‐Weller‐Pinkel [PWP]), the mixed‐layer heat budget diagnosis concluded that the entrainment term, rather than the surface heat flux term that usually dominates over the open ocean, was the dominant process for the significant SST cooling over the YSCWM. The PWP‐based experiments were conducted to set up one lookup table including the SST drop, wind speed, and subsurface temperature gradient, from which the YSCWM's intensity (represented by the subsurface temperature gradient) can be easily found with the satellite wind and SST measurements during the typhoon passage over the YS. This YSCWM‐anchored significant SST drop provides a promising possibility to detect the YSCWM intensity and extent, which have generally been poorly sampled to date.

Three‐Dimensional Temperature Responses to Northward‐Moving Typhoons in the Shallow Stratified Yellow Sea in Summer

“…Compared with previous studies (e.g., Guan et al, 2021;Yang, Li, Du, et al, 2019), the key novel results of the current study were that typhoons moving northward in the eastern YS could cause significant three-dimensional circulation changes, which further resulted in dramatic temperature changes below the surface mixed layer and fast southward movement of the YSCWM. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first time that the abovementioned findings have been reported.…”

Regional projection of climate warming effects on coastal seas in east China

“…Our regional model results suggest that climate warming may have long-term consequences to the coastal ecosystem. The Yellow Sea hosts biologically rich and productive fishing grounds in east China coastal waters, and the YSCWM is of central importance to local fishery (Li et al 2006, Fu et al 2016, Yang et al 2019. The increase of water temperature, the decrease of near-bottom oxygen concentration, and the disappearance of YSCWM may cause changes in fish distribution and migration pattern, and potentially lead to changes in fish species and shrink in fish stocks (Cheung et al 2016, Ho et al 2020.…”

The Tilt of Mean Dynamic Topography and its Seasonality Along the Coast of the Chinese Mainland

“…The model output has been proven to be in closest agreement, among a list of 11 ocean models, with the geodetic estimates of coastal tilt along the east coast of North America (Higginson et al., 2015). In addition, this model output has been extensively used in the China seas and proven to perform well in reproducing many features in, e.g., the South China Sea (e.g., Gordon et al., 2012; Park & Farmer, 2013), the East China Sea (e.g., Jia et al., 2013; Yu et al., 2015), and the Yellow Sea (e.g., Yang et al., 2019).…”