ABSTRACT Boundery-layer eddies 50 km across are documented for the morning of 10 May 1997 during ... more ABSTRACT Boundery-layer eddies 50 km across are documented for the morning of 10 May 1997 during the Cooperative Atmosphere Surface Exchange Study (CASES-97). CASES-97 was held from 21 April to 21 May 1997, in the lower Walnut River Watershed in south central Kansas, to study the role of the heterogeneous surface in boundary-layer evolution. The eddies appear to be tied to terrain, with warm, upwelling air over the relatively high terrain that forms the eastern edge of the watershed, and downwelling air over the watershed. The winds on this day were 5 m/s out of the south, and there were strong horizontal contrasts in vegetation and surface fluxes, suggesting that surfact fluxes could also play a role. For comparison, we examine two other days for the presence of mesoscale eddies, 29 April (characterized by high horizontal heterogeneity of vegetation and 10 m/s southerlies), and 20 May (characterized by a uniformly green and moist surface with winds ENE at 7 m/s). 29 April had significant but rapidly-changing horizontal variability at scales greater than 10 km, but variability on 20 May was on scales less than 5 km. Estimates of the sensible heat budgets for the three days revealed a large residual for 10 May, the day with the mesoscale eddies. Calculation of the expected errors and reasonable corrections for bias errors and radiative heating did not account for the residual, leading to the hypothesis that the residual is associated with the mesoscale eddies.
A unique, high-resolution, hydroclimate reanalysis, 40-plus-year (October 1979–September 2021), 4... more A unique, high-resolution, hydroclimate reanalysis, 40-plus-year (October 1979–September 2021), 4 km (named as CONUS404), has been created using the Weather Research and Forecasting Model by dynamically downscaling of the fifth-generation European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) atmospheric reanalysis of the global climate dataset (ERA5) over the conterminous United States. The paper describes the approach for generating the dataset, provides an initial evaluation, including biases, and indicates how interested users can access the data. The motivation for creating this National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR)–U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) collaborative dataset is to provide research and end-user communities with a high-resolution, self-consistent, long-term, continental-scale hydroclimate dataset appropriate for forcing hydrological models and conducting hydroclimate scientific analyses over the conterminous United States. The data are archived and accessib...
Vertical motions over the complex terrain of Idaho’s Payette River basin were observed by the Wyo... more Vertical motions over the complex terrain of Idaho’s Payette River basin were observed by the Wyoming Cloud Radar (WCR) during 23 flights of the Wyoming King Air during the Seeded and Natural Orographic Wintertime Clouds: The Idaho Experiment (SNOWIE) field campaign. The WCR measured radial velocity Vr, which includes the reflectivity-weighted terminal velocity of hydrometeors Vt, vertical air velocity w, horizontal wind contributions as a result of aircraft attitude deviations, and aircraft motion. Aircraft motion was removed through standard processing. To retrieve vertical radial velocity W, Vr was corrected using rawinsonde data and aircraft attitude measurements; w was then calculated by subtracting the mean W () at a given height along a flight leg long enough for to equal the mean reflectivity-weighted terminal velocity at that height. The accuracy of the w and retrievals were dependent on satisfying assumptions along a given flight leg that the winds at a given altitude abov...
A dry-air intrusion induced by the tropopause folding split the deep cloud into two layers result... more A dry-air intrusion induced by the tropopause folding split the deep cloud into two layers resulting in a shallow orographic cloud with a supercooled liquid cloud top at around −15°C and an ice cloud above it on 19 January 2017 during the Seeded and Natural Orographic Wintertime Clouds: The Idaho Experiment (SNOWIE). The airborne AgI seeding of this case was simulated by the WRF Weather Modification (WRF-WxMod) Model with different configurations. Simulations at different grid spacing, driven by different reanalysis data, using different model physics were conducted to explore the ability of WRF-WxMod to capture the properties of natural and seeded clouds. The detailed model–observation comparisons show that the simulation driven by ERA5 data, using Thompson–Eidhammer microphysics with 30% of the CCN climatology, best captured the observed cloud structure and supercooled liquid water properties. The ability of the model to correctly capture the wind field was critical for successful...
Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology, 2020
This paper presents an evaluation of the precipitation patterns and seedability of orographic clo... more This paper presents an evaluation of the precipitation patterns and seedability of orographic clouds in Wyoming using SNOTEL precipitation data and a high-resolution multiyear model simulation over an 8-yr period. A key part of assessing the potential for cloud seeding is to understand the natural precipitation patterns and how often atmospheric conditions and clouds meet cloud-seeding criteria. The analysis shows that high-resolution model simulations are useful tools for studying patterns of orographic precipitation and establishing the seedability of clouds by providing information that is either missed by or not available from current observational networks. This study indicates that the ground-based seeding potential in some mountain ranges in Wyoming is limited by flow blocking and/or prevailing winds that were not normal to the barrier to produce upslope flow. Airborne seeding generally had the most potential for all of the mountain ranges that were studied.
This study examines current and future western U.S. snowfall and snowpack through current and fut... more This study examines current and future western U.S. snowfall and snowpack through current and future climate simulations with a 4-km horizontal grid spacing cloud permitting regional climate model over the entire CONtinental U.S. for a 13-year period between 2001 and 2013. At this horizontal resolution, the spatiotemporal distribution of the orographic snowfall and snowpack is well captured partly due to the ability of the model to realistically simulate mesoscale and microphysical features such as orographically induced updrafts driving clouds and precipitation. The historical simulation well captures the observed snowfall and snowpack amounts and pattern in the western U.S. The future climate simulation uses the Pseudo-Global Warming approach, taking the climate change signal from CMIP5 multi-model ensemble-mean difference between 2070–2099 and 1976–2005. The results show that the thermodynamic impacts of climate change in the western U.S. can be characterized considering mountain...
ABSTRACT Boundery-layer eddies 50 km across are documented for the morning of 10 May 1997 during ... more ABSTRACT Boundery-layer eddies 50 km across are documented for the morning of 10 May 1997 during the Cooperative Atmosphere Surface Exchange Study (CASES-97). CASES-97 was held from 21 April to 21 May 1997, in the lower Walnut River Watershed in south central Kansas, to study the role of the heterogeneous surface in boundary-layer evolution. The eddies appear to be tied to terrain, with warm, upwelling air over the relatively high terrain that forms the eastern edge of the watershed, and downwelling air over the watershed. The winds on this day were 5 m/s out of the south, and there were strong horizontal contrasts in vegetation and surface fluxes, suggesting that surfact fluxes could also play a role. For comparison, we examine two other days for the presence of mesoscale eddies, 29 April (characterized by high horizontal heterogeneity of vegetation and 10 m/s southerlies), and 20 May (characterized by a uniformly green and moist surface with winds ENE at 7 m/s). 29 April had significant but rapidly-changing horizontal variability at scales greater than 10 km, but variability on 20 May was on scales less than 5 km. Estimates of the sensible heat budgets for the three days revealed a large residual for 10 May, the day with the mesoscale eddies. Calculation of the expected errors and reasonable corrections for bias errors and radiative heating did not account for the residual, leading to the hypothesis that the residual is associated with the mesoscale eddies.
A unique, high-resolution, hydroclimate reanalysis, 40-plus-year (October 1979–September 2021), 4... more A unique, high-resolution, hydroclimate reanalysis, 40-plus-year (October 1979–September 2021), 4 km (named as CONUS404), has been created using the Weather Research and Forecasting Model by dynamically downscaling of the fifth-generation European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) atmospheric reanalysis of the global climate dataset (ERA5) over the conterminous United States. The paper describes the approach for generating the dataset, provides an initial evaluation, including biases, and indicates how interested users can access the data. The motivation for creating this National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR)–U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) collaborative dataset is to provide research and end-user communities with a high-resolution, self-consistent, long-term, continental-scale hydroclimate dataset appropriate for forcing hydrological models and conducting hydroclimate scientific analyses over the conterminous United States. The data are archived and accessib...
Vertical motions over the complex terrain of Idaho’s Payette River basin were observed by the Wyo... more Vertical motions over the complex terrain of Idaho’s Payette River basin were observed by the Wyoming Cloud Radar (WCR) during 23 flights of the Wyoming King Air during the Seeded and Natural Orographic Wintertime Clouds: The Idaho Experiment (SNOWIE) field campaign. The WCR measured radial velocity Vr, which includes the reflectivity-weighted terminal velocity of hydrometeors Vt, vertical air velocity w, horizontal wind contributions as a result of aircraft attitude deviations, and aircraft motion. Aircraft motion was removed through standard processing. To retrieve vertical radial velocity W, Vr was corrected using rawinsonde data and aircraft attitude measurements; w was then calculated by subtracting the mean W () at a given height along a flight leg long enough for to equal the mean reflectivity-weighted terminal velocity at that height. The accuracy of the w and retrievals were dependent on satisfying assumptions along a given flight leg that the winds at a given altitude abov...
A dry-air intrusion induced by the tropopause folding split the deep cloud into two layers result... more A dry-air intrusion induced by the tropopause folding split the deep cloud into two layers resulting in a shallow orographic cloud with a supercooled liquid cloud top at around −15°C and an ice cloud above it on 19 January 2017 during the Seeded and Natural Orographic Wintertime Clouds: The Idaho Experiment (SNOWIE). The airborne AgI seeding of this case was simulated by the WRF Weather Modification (WRF-WxMod) Model with different configurations. Simulations at different grid spacing, driven by different reanalysis data, using different model physics were conducted to explore the ability of WRF-WxMod to capture the properties of natural and seeded clouds. The detailed model–observation comparisons show that the simulation driven by ERA5 data, using Thompson–Eidhammer microphysics with 30% of the CCN climatology, best captured the observed cloud structure and supercooled liquid water properties. The ability of the model to correctly capture the wind field was critical for successful...
Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology, 2020
This paper presents an evaluation of the precipitation patterns and seedability of orographic clo... more This paper presents an evaluation of the precipitation patterns and seedability of orographic clouds in Wyoming using SNOTEL precipitation data and a high-resolution multiyear model simulation over an 8-yr period. A key part of assessing the potential for cloud seeding is to understand the natural precipitation patterns and how often atmospheric conditions and clouds meet cloud-seeding criteria. The analysis shows that high-resolution model simulations are useful tools for studying patterns of orographic precipitation and establishing the seedability of clouds by providing information that is either missed by or not available from current observational networks. This study indicates that the ground-based seeding potential in some mountain ranges in Wyoming is limited by flow blocking and/or prevailing winds that were not normal to the barrier to produce upslope flow. Airborne seeding generally had the most potential for all of the mountain ranges that were studied.
This study examines current and future western U.S. snowfall and snowpack through current and fut... more This study examines current and future western U.S. snowfall and snowpack through current and future climate simulations with a 4-km horizontal grid spacing cloud permitting regional climate model over the entire CONtinental U.S. for a 13-year period between 2001 and 2013. At this horizontal resolution, the spatiotemporal distribution of the orographic snowfall and snowpack is well captured partly due to the ability of the model to realistically simulate mesoscale and microphysical features such as orographically induced updrafts driving clouds and precipitation. The historical simulation well captures the observed snowfall and snowpack amounts and pattern in the western U.S. The future climate simulation uses the Pseudo-Global Warming approach, taking the climate change signal from CMIP5 multi-model ensemble-mean difference between 2070–2099 and 1976–2005. The results show that the thermodynamic impacts of climate change in the western U.S. can be characterized considering mountain...
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