Data Assimilation and Predictability Studies for Improving Tropical Cyclone Intensity Forecasts

Abstract

This project aims to understand and improve the forecast of Tropical Cyclone (TC) lifecycle evolution and intensity, focusing on both large-scale environment and mesoscale phenomena in the TC system, which are major components responsible for intensity change. Two major challenges in TC intensity forecasting are the general lack of observations in the vicinity of TCs and the adaptive representation of the forecast error covariance. This project attempts to address both challenges for improving TC intensity forecasting. Intensive T-PARC (THORPEX1 Pacific Asian Regional Campaign) observations and other available observations will be assimilated with the LETKF (Local Ensemble Transform Kalman Filter) into the CFES (Coupled ocean-atmosphere general circulation model For the Earth Simulator) and the WRF (Weather Research and Forecasting) mesoscale model to study 1) the characteristics and role of coupled ocean-atmosphere covariance, 2) the impact of each observation assessed by an efficient ensemble sensitivity analysis method, 3) a better way to assimilate observations in the vicinity of the TC center and potential usefulness of Lagrangian data assimilation (LaDA), 4) several new data assimilation techniques to improve the performance of LETKF, and 5) the predictability of TC intensity due to the uncertainty of initial conditions.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Jan 01, 2010
Accession Number
ADA539117

Entities

People

  • Craig Bishop
  • Eugenia Kalnay
  • Kayo Ide
  • Takemasa Miyoshi

Organizations

  • University of Maryland

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Space

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Applied Mathematics
  • Assimilation
  • Climate Change
  • Computer Simulations
  • Covariance
  • Cyclones
  • Economic Development
  • Education
  • Electronic Mail
  • Intensity
  • Kalman Filters
  • Military Operations
  • National Security
  • Quality Of Life
  • Simulators
  • Statistics
  • Tropical Cyclones

Fields of Study

  • Environmental science

Readers

  • Adaptive Control and Estimation with Uncertainty in Dynamic Systems.
  • Atmospheric Science/Meteorology
  • Ocean-Atmosphere Mesoscale Modeling, Data Assimilation, and Flux Boundary Layers