Improved Tropical Cyclone Forecasts with Increased Vertical Resolution in the TRAMS Model

The numerical simulation of typhoons has been found to be very sensitive to the vertical resolution of the model. During the updating of the TRAMS model from version 1.0 to 3.0, the horizontal resolution has been increased from 36 km to 9 km, while the vertical layer number only increased from 55 to 65 layers. The lack of high vertical resolution limits the performance of the TRAMS model in typhoon forecasting to a certain extent. In order to study the potential improvement of typhoon forecasting by increasing the vertical resolution, this paper increases the vertical resolution of the TRAMS model from 65 to 125 layers for the first time for a comparative simulation test. The results of the case study with Typhoon Hato (2017) show that the model with high vertical resolution can significantly enhance the warm structure caused by water vapor flux convergence and vertical transport, thus accurately simulating the rapid strengthening process of the typhoon. Meanwhile, the model with 125-layer vertical resolution can simulate the asymmetric structural characteristics of the wind field, which are closer to the observations and can help to reduce the bias in typhoon track forecasting. The improvement of vertical resolution is also trialed by using the batch test results of several landfalling typhoons in 2016-2017. The experimental results show that the typhoon forecast of the model becomes consistent with the observations only when the number of vertical layers of the model increases to about 125 layers, which in turn causes a large computational burden. In the next step, we will try to solve the computational burden problem caused by ultra-high vertical resolution with the top boundary nesting technique, and realize the application of high vertical resolution in the actual operation of the TRAMS model.     

阳江复杂地形对特大暴雨影响机理的数值研究

采用中尺度天气预报模式WRF (Weather Research Forecast)对广东省阳江地区2019年5月26日00时—28日00时暴雨事件进行数值模拟,并通过一系列的地形敏感试验,讨论地形对暴雨发生和发展的影响。结果表明:地形对暴雨的影响显著,地形的高度影响暴雨的强度和位置;与未作任何改变的控制试验相比,地形降低试验和细网格地形高度取平均试验无山脉的阻挡,阳江地区无爬流和绕流运动及相对涡度减小,南风将低层水汽和能量带到更北的位置,暴雨中心随之北抬;增高地形试验,由于山脉阻挡,更多水汽和能量堆积,以及地形的阻挡产生绕流和爬流运动,绕流有利于局地涡旋生成,爬流运动会增加垂直运动速度,正涡度中心增强,低层的水汽辐合上升凝结,造成更大暴雨。