Simulation of a Persistent Snow Storm over Southern China with a Regional Atmosphere-Ocean Coupled Model

A regional atmosphere-ocean coupled model, RegCM3-POM, was developed by coupling the regional climate model （RegCM3） with the Princeton Ocean Model （POM）. The performance of RegCM3-POM in simulating a persistent snow storm over southern China and the impact of the Madden Julian oscillation （MJO） on this persistent snow storm were investigated. Compared with the stand-alone RegCM3, the coupled model performed better at reproducing the spatial-temporal evolution and intensity of the precipitation episodes. The power spectral analysis indicated that the coupled model successfully captured the dominant period between 30 and 60 days in the precipitation field, leading to a notable improvement in simulating the magnitude of intraseasonal precipitation variation, and further in enhancing the intensity of the simulated precipitation. These improvements were mainly due to the well-simulated low-frequency oscillation center and its eastward propagation characteristics in each MJO phase by RegCM3-POM, which improved the simulations of MJO-related low-frequency vertical motions, water vapor transport, and the deep inversion layer that can directly influence the precipitation event and that further improved the simulated MJOprecipitation relationship. Analysis of the phase relationship between convection and SST indicated that RegCM3-POM exhibits a near-quadrature relation between the simulated convection and SST anomalies, which was consistent with the observations. However, such a near-quadrature relation was not as significant when the stand-alone RegCM3 was used. This difference indicated that the inherent coupled feedback process between the ocean and atmosphere in RegCM3-POM played an important part in reproducing the features of the MJO that accompanied the snow storm.

Simulation of a Freezing Rain and Snow Storm Event over Southern China in January 2008 Using RIEMS 2.0

The Regional Integrated Environmental Model System （RIEMS 2.0） with NCEP Reanalysis II is utilized to simulate the severe freezing rain and snow storm event over southern China in January 2008, which caused severe damage in the region. The relationships between the freezing rain process and the large-scale cir- culation, in terms of the westerly and low-level jets, water vapor transportation, and northerly wind area/intensity indices, were analyzed to tmderstand the mechanisms of the freezing rain occurrence. The results indicate the fol- lowing： （1） RIEMS 2.0 reproduced the pattern of precipi- tation in January 2008 well, especially for the temporal evolution of daily precipitation averaged over the Yangtze River valley and southern China; （2） RIEMS 2.0 repro- duced the persistent trough in the South Branch of the westerlies, of which the southwesterly currents trans- ported abundant moisture into southern China; （3） RIEMS 2.0 reasonably reproduced the pattern of frequencies of light and moderate rain, although it overestimated the frequency of rain in southern China. This study shows that RIEMS 2.0 can be feasibly applied to study extreme weather and climate events in East Asia.

A Preliminary Analysis of Features and Causes of the Snow Storm Event over the Southern Areas of China in January 2008

Four successive freezing rain/heavy snowfall processes occurred in the southern part of China from 11 January to 2 February 2008 （named ＂0801 Southern Snow Disaster＂ hereafter）, during which a large-scale blocking circulation lasted for a long time over the mid-high latitudes of the Euro-Asian continent. This severe event is featured with a broad spatial scale, strong intensity, long duration, and serious damage. During the event, the blocking situation in the mid-high latitudes maintained quasi-sationary, but weather systems in the lower latitudes were active. Abundant water vapor was supplied, and favorable weather conditions for ice storms were formed over the large areas across the southern part of China. The results in this paper demonstrate that the significant factors responsible for the abnormal atmospheric circulation and this severe event include： 1） the very active Arctic Oscillation （AO）, which helped the permanent maintenance of the planetary-scale waves; 2） the continuous transfer of negative vorticity from the upstream region around 50°E into the blocking area, which caused the blocking situation reinforced repeatedly and sustained for a long time; and 3） the active air currents south of the Tibetan Plateau, which ensured abundant moisture supply to the southern areas of China. The 0801 Southern Snow Disaster was accompanied by extremely severe icing. In this paper, the data from Cloud-Profile Radar onboard the satellite CloudSat are used to study the dynamic and microphysical features of this event. The results show that there existed a melting layer between 2 and 4 km, and ice particles could be found above this layer and in the layer near the ground surface. Surface temperature kept between -4℃ and 0℃ with relative humidity over 90%, which provided the descending supercooled waterdrops with favorable synoptic and physical conditions to form glaze and ice at the surface via freezing, deposition and/or accretion. Causes of the event might be, as a whole, traced back to the planetary-scale systems. The study on the polar vortex anomaly in this paper reveals that changes in the polar vortex in the stratosphere preceded those in the troposphere, especially in early December 2007, while the intensification of the polar vortex in the troposphere delayed dramatically until middle January and early February of 2008. This implies that changes in the polar vortex in the stratosphere may be a precursor of the ensuing severe event and a meaningful clue for extended forecasts of such a disaster.

The Unprecedented Freezing Disaster in January 2008 in Southern China and Its Possible Association with the Global Warming

The unprecedented disaster of low temperature and persistent rain, snow, and ice storms, causing widespread freezing in the Yangtze River Basin and southern China in January 2008, is not a local or regional event, but a part of the chain events of large-scale low temperature and snow storms in the same period in Asia. The severity and impacts of the southern China 2008 freezing disaster were the most significant among others. This disastrous event was characterized by three major features： （1） snowfall, freezing rain, and rainfall, the three forms of precipitation, coexisted with freezing rain being the dominant producer responsible for the disaster; （2） low temperature, rain and snow, and freezing rain exhibited extremely great intensity, with record-breaking measurements observed for eight meteorological variables based on the statistics made by China National Climate Center and the provincial meteorological services in the Yangtze River Basin and southern China; （3） the disastrous weathers persisted for an exceptionally long time period, unrecorded before in the meteorological observation history of China. The southern China 2008 freezing disaster may be resulted from multiple different factors that superimpose on and interlink with one another at the right time and place. Among them, the La Nina situation is a climate background that provided conducive conditions for the intrusions of cold air into southern China; the persistent anomaly of the atmospheric circulation in Eurasia is the direct cause for a succession of cold air incursions into southern China; and the northward transport of warm and moist airflows from the Bay of Bengal and South China Sea finally warranted the formation of the freezing rain and snow storms and their prolonged dominance in the southern areas of China. A preliminary discussion of a possible association of this disastrous event with the global warming is presented. This event may be viewed as a short-term regional perturbation to the global warming. There is not any possibility for this event to divert the long-term trend and the overall pattern of the global warming.