Attributes of cut-off low induced rainfall over the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa

Cut-off low (COL) weather systems that are associated with rainfall over the Eastern Cape are considered in this study. COLs are objectively identified and tracked over a 31-year period. Daily rainfall data of 22 evenly distributed stations over the Eastern Cape are utilized. Only COLs with a minimum spatial distribution, defined as more than a third of the rainfall stations that need to report rainfall on at least 1 day of a COL event, are considered for analysis of rainfall attributes. These attributes include the occurrence of COL rain days of different magnitudes, the distribution of the depth and temperature of the COL centres for the rain days of different magnitudes, the associated spatial distribution of rainfall as well as the associated atmospheric circulation. The frequency of COLs over the Eastern Cape has a winter maximum and a summer minimum. COL rain days of small, medium and large magnitudes occur most frequently during the winter, while small- and medium-magnitude COL rain days experience peaks in autumn and spring, respectively. The low-level flow, and in particular the position of the low/trough, seems to be the determinant factor in the occurrence, magnitude and spatial extent of COL-induced rainfall.     

Variability of rainfall characteristics over the South Coast region of South Africa

Thirty years of daily rainfall data are analysed for the South Coast region of South Africa, a region which experiences substantial rainfall variability and frequent severe drought and flood events, but whose climate variability has not been much researched. It is found that El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) exerts an influence since most wet years correspond to mature phase La Niña years. ENSO also influences South Coast rainfall via increases in the number of cut-off lows in southern South Africa during mature phase La Niña years. A statistically significant correlation between the Niño 3.4 index and monthly rainfall totals, and between this index and the frequency of wet days, exists for two summer months and also for June. There are also changes in the heavy rainfall day frequencies from one decade to another. Examination of NCEP re-analyses indicates that wet (dry) years result from an equatorward (poleward) shift in the subtropical jet, cyclonic (anticyclonic) pressure anomalies over the South Atlantic and South Africa, and increased (decreased) density of mid-latitude cyclonic systems.     

Drought in the Eastern Cape region of South Africa and trends in rainfall characteristics

Much of the Eastern Cape province in South Africa has been experiencing a severe drought since 2015. This drought has had major socio-economic effects particularly on the large impoverished rural population as well as on some urban areas where supplied water services have broken down in several cases. The region is influenced by both midlatitude and tropical systems leading to a complex regional meteorology that hitherto has not been much studied compared to other parts of South Africa. Here, the ongoing drought is examined in the context of long-term trends and the interannual rainfall variability of the region. Although the region has experienced drought in all seasons since 2015, focus here is placed on the spring (September–November) which shows the most consistent and robust signal. On average, this season contributes between about 25–35% of the annual rainfall total. Based on CHIRPS data, it is found that this season shows a significant decreasing trend in both rainfall totals as well as the number of rainfall days (but not heavy rainfall days) for spring over most of the province since 1981. On interannual time scales, the results indicate that dry (wet) springs over the Eastern Cape are associated with a cyclonic (anticyclonic) anomaly southeast of South Africa as part of a shift in the zonal wavenumber 3 pattern in the midlatitudes. Over the landmass, a stronger (weaker) Botswana High is also apparent with increased (decreased) subsidence over and near the Eastern Cape which is less (more) favourable for cloud band development and hence reduced (enhanced) rainfall during dry (wet) springs. Analysis of mid-century (2040–2060) CMIP5 rainfall projections suggests that there may be a flattening of the annual cycle over the Eastern Cape with the winter becoming wetter and the summer drier. For the spring season of interest here, the multi-model projections also indicate drying but less pronounced than that projected for the summer.

     

Convection activity over the Guinean coast and Central Africa during northern spring from synoptic to intra-seasonal timescales

This study proposes an overview of the main synoptic, medium-range and intraseasonal modes of convection and precipitation in northern spring (March–June 1979–2010) over West and Central Africa, and to understand their atmospheric dynamics. It is based on daily National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration outgoing longwave radiation and Cloud Archive User Service Tb convection data, daily TRMM and Global Precipitation Climatology Project rainfall products and daily ERA-Interim reanalysis atmospheric fields. It is first shown that mesoscale convective systems can be modulated in terms of occurrences number and intensity at such time scales. Based on empirical orthogonal function analyses on the 2–90-day filtered data it is shown that the main mode of convective and rainfall variability is located along the Guinean coast with a moderate to weak extension over Central Africa. Corresponding regressed deseasonalised atmospheric fields highlight an eastward propagation of patterns consistent with convectively coupled equatorial Kelvin wave dynamics. Then a singular spectrum analysis combined with a Hierarchical Ascendant Classification enable to define objectively the main spectral bands of variability within the 2–90-day band, and highlight three main bands, 2–8-, 8–22- and 20–90-day. Within these three bands, space–time spectral decomposition is used to identify the relative impacts of convectively coupled equatorial Kelvin, Rossby and inertia–gravity waves, as well as Madden–Julian Oscillation (MJO) signal. It confirms that eastward propagating signals (convectively coupled equatorial Kelvin wave and MJO) are highly dominant in these convection and precipitation variability modes over the Guinean coast during northern spring. So, while rain-producing individual systems are moving westward, their activity are highly modulated by sub-regional and regional scales envelops moving to the east. This is a burning issue for operational forecasting centers to be able to monitor and predict such eastward propagating envelops of convective activity.     

Intense rainfall events over the west coast of India

Summary The west coast of the Indian peninsula receives very heavy rainfall during the summer Monsoon (June–September) season with average rainfall over some parts exceeding 250 cm. Heavy rainfall events with rainfall more than 15 cm day⁻¹ at one or more stations along the west coast of India occur frequently and cause considerable damage. A special observational programme, Arabian Sea Monsoon Experiment, was carried out during the monsoon season of 2002 to study these events. The spatial and temporal distributions of intense rainfall events, presented here, were used for the planning of this observational campaign. The present study using daily rainfall data for summer monsoon season of 37 years (1951–1987) shows that the probability of getting intense rainfall is the maximum between 14° N–16° N and near 19° N. The probability of occurrence of these intense rainfall events is high from mid June to mid August, with a dip in early July. It has been believed for a long time that offshore troughs and vortices are responsible for these intense rainfall events. However, analysis of the characteristics of cloud systems associated with the intense rainfall events during 1985–1988 using very high resolution brightness temperature data from INSAT-IB satellite shows that the cloud systems during these events are characterized by large spatial scales and high cloud tops. Further study using daily satellite derived outgoing longwave radiation (OLR) data over a longer period (1975–1998) shows that, most of these events (about 62%) are associated with systems organized on synoptic and larger scales. We find that most of the offshore convective systems responsible for intense rainfall along the west coast of India are linked to the atmospheric conditions over equatorial Indian Ocean.     

SST variability in the South Indian Ocean and associated circulation and rainfall patterns over Southern Africa

Summary A general circulation model is used to study the response of the atmosphere to an idealised sea surface temperature (SST) anomaly pattern (warm throughout the southern midlatitudes, cool in the tropics) in the South Indian Ocean region. The anomaly imposed on monthly SST climatology captures the essence of patterns observed in the South Indian Ocean during both ENSO events and multidecadal epochs, and facilitates diagnosis of the model response. A previous study with this anomaly imposed in the model examined differences in the response between that on the seasonal scale (favours enhancement of the original SST anomaly) and that on the decadal scale (favours damping of the anomaly). The current study extends that work firstly by comparing the response on the intraseasonal, seasonal and interannual scales, and secondly, by assessing the changes in the circulation and rainfall over the adjoining African landmass.It is found that the atmospheric response is favourable for enhancement of the original SST anomaly on scales up to, and including, annual. However, as the scale becomes interannual (i.e., 15–21 months after imposition of the anomaly), the model response suggests that damping of the original SST anomaly becomes likely. Compared to the shorter scale response, the perturbation pressure and wind distribution on the interannual scale is shifted poleward, and is more reminiscent of the decadal response. Winds are now stronger over the warm anomaly in the southern midlatitudes suggesting enhanced surface fluxes, upper ocean mixing, and consequently, a damping of the anomaly.Examination of the circulation and rainfall patterns indicates that there are significant anomalies over large parts of southern Africa during the spring, summer and autumn seasons for both short (intraseasonal to interannual) and decadal scales. It appears that rainfall anomalies are associated with changes in the advection of moist tropical air from the Indian Ocean and its related convergence over southern Africa. Over eastern equatorial Africa, the austral autumn season (the main wet season) showed rainfall increases on all time scales, while parts of central to eastern subtropical southern Africa were dry. The signals during summer were more varied. Spring showed generally dry conditions over the eastern half of southern Africa on both short and decadal time scales, with wet areas confined to the west. In all cases, the magnitude of the rainfall anomalies accumulated over a 90 day season were of the order of 90–180 mm, and therefore represent a significant fraction of the annual total of many areas. It appears that relatively modest SST anomalies in the South Indian Ocean can lead to sizeable rainfall anomalies in the model. Although precipitation in general circulation models tends to be less accurately simulated than many other variables, the model results, together with previous observational work, emphasize the need for ongoing monitoring of SST in this region.With 14 Figures     

Simulation of the annual and diurnal cycles of rainfall over South Africa by a regional climate model

The capability of a current state-of-the-art regional climate model for simulating the diurnal and annual cycles of rainfall over a complex subtropical region is documented here. Hourly rainfall is simulated over Southern Africa for 1998–2006 by the non-hydrostatic model weather research and forecasting (WRF), and compared to a network of 103 stations covering South Africa. We used five simulations, four of which consist of different parameterizations for atmospheric convection at a 0.5 × 0.5° resolution, performed to test the physic-dependency of the results. The fifth experiment uses explicit convection over tropical South Africa at a 1/30° resolution. WRF simulates realistic mean rainfall fields, albeit wet biases over tropical Africa. The model mean biases are strongly modulated by the convective scheme used for the simulations. The annual cycle of rainfall is well simulated over South Africa, mostly influenced by tropical summer rainfall except in the Western Cape region experiencing winter rainfall. The diurnal cycle shows a timing bias, with atmospheric convection occurring too early in the afternoon, and causing too abundant rainfall. This result, particularly true in summer over the northeastern part of the country, is weakly physic-dependent. Cloud-resolving simulations do not clearly reduce the diurnal cycle biases. In the end, the rainfall overestimations appear to be mostly imputable to the afternoon hours of the austral summer rainy season, i.e., the periods during which convective activity is intense over the region.     

Performance assessment of three convective parameterization schemes in WRF for downscaling summer rainfall over South Africa

Austral summer rainfall over the period 1991/1992 to 2010/2011 was dynamically downscaled by the weather research and forecasting (WRF) model at 9 km resolution for South Africa. Lateral boundary conditions for WRF were provided from the European Centre for medium-range weather (ECMWF) reanalysis (ERA) interim data. The model biases for the rainfall were evaluated over the South Africa as a whole and its nine provinces separately by employing three different convective parameterization schemes, namely the (1) Kain–Fritsch (KF), (2) Betts–Miller–Janjic (BMJ) and (3) Grell–Devenyi ensemble (GDE) schemes. All three schemes have generated positive rainfall biases over South Africa, with the KF scheme producing the largest biases and mean absolute errors. Only the BMJ scheme could reproduce the intensity of rainfall anomalies, and also exhibited the highest correlation with observed interannual summer rainfall variability. In the KF scheme, a significantly high amount of moisture was transported from the tropics into South Africa. The vertical thermodynamic profiles show that the KF scheme has caused low level moisture convergence, due to the highly unstable atmosphere, and hence contributed to the widespread positive biases of rainfall. The negative bias in moisture, along with a stable atmosphere and negative biases of vertical velocity simulated by the GDE scheme resulted in negative rainfall biases, especially over the Limpopo Province. In terms of rain rate, the KF scheme generated the lowest number of low rain rates and the maximum number of moderate to high rain rates associated with more convective unstable environment. KF and GDE schemes overestimated the convective rain and underestimated the stratiform rain. However, the simulated convective and stratiform rain with BMJ scheme is in more agreement with the observations. This study also documents the performance of regional model in downscaling the large scale climate mode such as El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and subtropical dipole modes. The correlations between the simulated area averaged rainfalls over South Africa and Nino3.4 index were ?0.66, ?0.69 and ?0.49 with KF, BMJ and GDE scheme respectively as compared to the observed correlation of ?0.57. The model could reproduce the observed ENSO-South Africa rainfall relationship and could successfully simulate three wet (dry) years that are associated with La Niña (El Niño) and the BMJ scheme is closest to the observed variability. Also, the model showed good skill in simulating the excess rainfall over South Africa that is associated with positive subtropical Indian Ocean Dipole for the DJF season 2005/2006.     

Climatic change over the Lowveld of South Africa

There has been a 38% decrease in expected annual rainfall totals over the Lowveld, in the eastern part of South Africa, during the last two decades. The downward trend in mean annual rainfall is not replicated in the rest of the summer rainfall region above the escarpment. Rainfall variability over the Lowveld has been increasing since about the 1950s, although the increase in variability appears to have been slowing down in more recent years. Changes in the frequency and intensity of El Niño/Southern Oscillation extreme events are only partly responsible for the observed desiccation and increase in rainfall variability. The CSIRO 9-level general circulation model simulates, for 2 × CO₂ conditions, an insignificant decrease of 10% in the annual mean and a slight increase in the inter-annual variability of rainfall over the Lowveld. Other general circulation models likewise simulate only small changes in annual mean rainfall over the region. However, the simulated increase in rainfall variability by the CSIRO 9-level model is likely to be conservative since the model, being linked to a slab ocean, is unable to represent important features of ocean-atmosphere coupling in the region. Significant changes in the frequencies of extreme drought events and of heavy rains in the Lowveld are likely to occur even with only small changes in the rainfall climatology of the region.     

Interactions between synoptic, intraseasonal and interannual convective variability over Southern Africa

After removing the annual cycle, a principal component analysis is applied to the daily outgoing longwave radiation anomaly field, used here as a proxy for atmospheric convection. The analysis is carried out over the southern African region (7.5°E–70°E, 10°S–40°S) for austral summer (November through February) for the period 1979–1980 to 2006–2007. The first five principal components (PC) are retained. The first two PCs describe spatial patterns oriented north-west to south-east from tropical southern Africa (SA) to the mid-latitudes. They are interpreted to be different possible locations for synoptic-scale tropical–temperate troughs (TTT), one dominant rainfall-producing synoptic system in the region. The phase relationship between these two PCs describes a tendency for these TTT to propagate eastwards from SA to the Mozambique Channel and southern Madagascar. The next three PCs describe convective fluctuations, respectively, located over the north-west, the south and the centre of SA. Their time series are significantly associated with Madden–Julian oscillation (MJO) activity in the tropics. However, we find that TTT systems are statistically independent of the MJO, i.e. they are equally liable to occur during any phase of the MJO. Three PCs out of five also show a significant association with El Niño southern oscillation, confirming that El Niño years mostly coincide with suppressed convection at the intraseasonal time-scales, a result consistent with its impact on seasonal averages diagnosed in previous studies.     

Mechanism of high rainfall over the Indian west coast region during the monsoon season

The mechanism responsible for high rainfall over the Indian west coast region has been investigated by studying dynamical, thermodynamical and microphysical processes over the region for the monsoon season of 2009. The European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts wind and NCEP flux data have been used to study the large scale dynamical parameters. The moist adiabatic and multi-level inversion stratifications are found to exist during the high and low rainfall spells, respectively. In the moist adiabatic stratification regime, shallow and deep convective clouds are found coexisting. The Cloud Aerosol Interaction and Precipitation Enhancement EXperiment aircraft data showed cloud updraft spectrum ranging from 1 to 10 m s^?1 having modal speed 1–2.5 m s^?1. The low updrafts rates provide sufficient time required for warm rain processes to produce rainfall from shallow clouds. The low cloud liquid water is observed above the freezing level indicating efficient warm rain process. The updrafts at the high spectrum end go above freezing level to generate ice particles produced due to mixed-phase rainfall process from deep convective clouds. With aging, deep convection gets transformed into stratiform type, which has been inferred through the vertical distribution of the large scale omega and heating fields. The stratiform heating, high latent heat flux, strong wind shear in the lower and middle tropospheric levels and low level convergence support the sustenance of convection for longer time to produce high rainfall spell. The advection of warm dry air in the middle tropospheric regions inhibits the convection and produce low rainfall spell. The mechanisms producing these spells have been summarized with the block diagram.     

Northeast monsoon rainfall variability over south peninsular India and its teleconnections

Rainfall over south peninsular India during the northeast (NE) monsoon season (Oct–Dec) shows significant interannual variation. In the present study, we relate the northeast monsoon rainfall (NEMR) over south peninsular India with the major oscillations like El Ni?o Southern Oscillation (ENSO), Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD), and Equatorial Indian Ocean Oscillation (EQUINOO) in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. For establishing the teleconnections, sea surface temperature, outgoing long wave radiation, and circulation data have been used. The present study reveals that the positive phase of ENSO, IOD, and EQUINOO favor the NEMR to be normal or above normal over southern peninsular India. The study reveals that the variability of NEMR over south peninsula can be well explained by its relationship with positive phase of ENSO, IOD, and EQUINOO.     

影响江南春雨年际变化的前期海洋信号及可能机理

利用1980—2017年华南地区303个国家级地面气象站逐小时降水数据、ERA-Interim再分析资料,分析华南前汛期（4—6月）降水统计特征,定义站点上短时（1—6 h）、中等时长（7—12 h）和长时（>12 h）降水事件,对比降水量、频次和强度在南海季风爆发前后的变化,以及所定义的西部内陆、东部内陆、沿海地区的异同。结果表明：（1）南海季风爆发后,研究区域平均而言,三类降水事件的降水量增多、小时降水强度增强,短时、长时降水事件发生频次增多,而中等时长降水事件发生频次有所减少。（2）从空间分布来看,南海季风爆发后,小时降水强度在整个华南地区均增强,西部内陆时长大于6 h的降水事件尤为明显;降水事件的发生频次在西部内陆和沿海地区升高,而东部内陆时长大于6 h的降水事件发生频次降低,因此,季风爆发后西部内陆和沿海地区的总降水量均显著增大,而东部内陆的总降水量变化不大。（3）西部内陆降水事件主要在夜间开始发生,持续时间越长的事件越早开始,且由西向东逐渐推迟;东部内陆短时降水事件主要在14时（北京时,下同）左右开始,季风爆发后更为明显,而时长大于6 h的降水事件的开始时间和峰值时间无明显的分布规律;沿海地区短时降水事件在季风爆发前主要于05—08时开始,季风爆发后,在海岸线约50 km以内仍然如此,而较远离海岸线的短时降水事件主要于14时开始,沿海地区长时降水事件在季风爆发前、后都倾向于在夜间开始,并在日间出现峰值。

     

The interdecadal variations of the summer monsoon rainfall over South China

Summary This paper is to promote a further understanding of the interdecadal variations of the summer monsoon rainfall over South China (SCMR). With this focus, we will specifically aim at better understanding possible mechanism responsible for such an interdecadal variation relationship between the SCMR and El Ni?o/Southern Oscillation (ENSO). In many of the previous studies on precipitation, the datasets used are satellite observations or gridded reanalyzed data due to the lack of long-term reliable observations over the marginal seas of the Asian continent. Such an approach could lead to possible errors in the results. In this work, several representative stations with long-term rain-gauge observations are chosen to reduce such uncertainty. The study of the interdecadal variabilities of SCMR indicates that there is a strong linkage between SCMR and ENSO on the interdecadal variations. These results agree well with those from previous studies that the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) and ENSO are not independent of each other, the interannual and interdecadal variations of tropical Pacific Sea Surface temperatures (SSTs) could affect the interdecadal variations of the SCMR, and the incorporating information on the PDO/ENSO could improve the long-term prediction of the SCMR.