Synergistic Effect of the Planetary-scale Disturbance, Typhoon and Meso-β-scale Convective Vortex on the Extremely Intense Rainstorm on 20 July 2021 in Zhengzhou

On 20 July 2021,northern Henan Province in China experienced catastrophic flooding as a result of an extremely intense rainstorm,with a record-breaking hourly rainfall of 201.9 mm during 0800–0900 UTC and daily accumulated rainfall in Zhengzhou City exceeding 600 mm(“Zhengzhou 7.20 rainstorm”for short).The multi-scale dynamical and thermodynamical mechanisms for this rainstorm are investigated based on station-observed and ERA-5 reanalysis datasets.The backward trajectory tracking shows that the warm,moist air from the northwestern Pacific was mainly transported toward Henan Province by confluent southeasterlies on the northern side of a strong typhoon In-Fa(2021),with the convergent southerlies associated with a weaker typhoon Cempaka(2021)concurrently transporting moisture northward from South China Sea,supporting the rainstorm.In the upper troposphere,two equatorward-intruding potential vorticity(PV)streamers within the planetary-scale wave train were located over northern Henan Province,forming significant divergent flow aloft to induce stronger ascending motion locally.Moreover,the converged moist air was also blocked by the mountains in western Henan Province and forced to rise so that a deep meso-β-scale convective vortex(MβCV)was induced over the west of Zhengzhou City.The PV budget analyses demonstrate that the MβCV development was attributed to the positive feedback between the rainfall-related diabatic heating and high-PV under the strong upward PV advection during the Zhengzhou 7.20 rainstorm.Importantly,the MβCV was forced by upper-level larger-scale westerlies becoming eastward-sloping,which allowed the mixtures of abundant raindrops and hydrometeors to ascend slantwise and accumulate just over Zhengzhou City,resulting in the record-breaking hourly rainfall locally.

Mechanism Analysis of " 7·21" Extremely Heavy Rainstorm Process in 2012 in Beijing

Extremely heavy rainstorm occurred in Beijing on July 21,2012, which was the most serious since 1961. Based on analyzing the precipitation characteristics, formation mechanism of the rainstorm process was analyzed. Results showed that when the precipitation process occurred, it was stable east-high and west-low situation at 500 hPa, and there was a steady stream of water vapor transportation at middle and low layers and strong vertical ascending motion at 700 hPa. The distribution of physical quantity field （relative humidity, vorticity and divergence） showed that they were all benefited to the formation of rainstorm. Then, falling zone of rainstorm and the movement of rain belt, generation, development and weakening of precipitation were analyzed. Finally, according to circulation situation and the distribution of physical quantity at each layer, vertical distribu- tion of physical quantity and distribution of water vapor and jet stream, ＂7 · 21＂ rainstorm model was summarized.

Analysis on the Cause and Forecast Deviation of an Extreme Rainstorm in Changsha Urban Area

Using NCEP reanalysis data,high-altitude and ground observation data,numerical model data,satellite and radar data,formation cause and forecast deviation of an extreme rainstorm process in Changsha urban area at night on June 9,2020 were analyzed.The results showed that(1)the extreme rainstorm process developed near the surface convergence line,with strong localization,short duration and large hourly rainfall intensity.(2)Under the high temperature and high humidity environment,the low-level cold advection and the hot low-pressure system interacted,and the potential con-vective unstable energy was released,and a strong convective weather was formed.(3)The convergence of water vapor in the lower layer and the strong upward movement provided sufficient water vapor for the rainstorm.The low-centroid thunderstorm was the main reason for the extreme rainstorm.(4)The forecast deviation of the numerical model to the low-level shear line and the mesoscale convergence line was an important reason for the forecast deviation of the heavy rainfall area.

Doppler Radar Analysis on A Local Heavy Precipitation in Jieyang Area of Guangdong

By using Doppler weather radar data,the meso-scale characteristics of extremely heavy rainstorm process which happened suddenly in Jieyang urban area on July 31,2008 were analyzed.The results showed that the radar echo only needed 20 minutes from the generation to the strong echo which quickly strengthened above 50 dBz.The storm center went down south and went up north near Jieyang City all the time.The component which moved eastward was very tiny,and the heavy precipitation echo stagnated.In this heavy precipitation process,the characteristics types of radial velocity which were favorable to the generation and development of heavy precipitation echo appeared alternately each other.The radial velocity's characteristics types were the first type headwind zone,the second type headwind zone,meso-scale convergence type and cyclonic convergence and so on.Thus,this heavy precipitation process which broke the record happened.The analyses showed that the headwind zone which developed vigorously and the convergence which had influx and outflux airflow in the vertical direction of headwind zone made obvious contributions to the precipitation.

Responses of flood peaks to land use and landscape patterns under extreme rainstorms in small catchments-A case study of the rainstorm of Typhoon Lekima in Shandong,China

Investigations of the formation mechanisms of flood peaks in small catchments facilitate flood prediction and disaster prevention under extreme rainstorms.However,there have been few studies on the re-sponses of flood peaks to land use landscape patterns using field surveys during extreme rainstorm events.Based on field data from 17 small catchments near the rainstorm center of Typhoon Lekima,7 landscape indices were chosen.The flood peak and its sensitivity to the land use landscape were investigated by combining remote sensing interpretation and related analysis.The conclusions are as follows:(1)The peak discharge of the small catchment was 2.36e56.50 m3/s,the peak modulus was 8.00 e48.89 m3/(s$km2),and the flood index K ranged from 3.61 to 4.55.(2)Under similar rainfall conditions,the flood peak modulus,K and the proportion of sloping cropland had significantly positive correlations(p<0.05).The flood peak modulus was significantly negatively correlated with the proportion of forest-grassland and terrace(p<0.05),and K and the proportion of forest-grassland and terraced land exhibited a negative correlation.(3)The flood peak modulus and K were positively correlated with the landscape fragmentation.(4)The sensitivities of small catchments to floods were evaluated to be moderate compared to K values from other studies.The ability of small catchments to cope with extreme rain-storms can be improved by increasing the areas of forest-grassland,and terraces and reducing landscape fragmentation.Our results could be applied to provide a basis for land use planning and support for the response against disasters caused by extreme floods.

Flood cascading on critical infrastructure with climate change:A spatial analysis of the extreme weather event in Xinxiang,China

Floods caused by extreme weather events and climate change have increased in occurrence and severity all over the world,resulting in devastation and disruption of activities.Researchers and policy practitioners have increasingly paid attention to the role of critical infrastructure(CI)in disaster risk reduction,flood resilience and climate change adaptation in terms of its backbone functions in maintaining societal services in hazard attacks.The analysed city in this study,Xinxiang(Henan province,China),was affected by an extreme flood event that occurred on 17–23 July 2021,which caused great socio-economic losses.However,few studies have focused on medium-sized cities and the flood cascading effects on CI during this event.Therefore,this study explores the damages caused by this flooding event with links to CI,such as health services,energy supply stations,shelters and transport facilities(HEST infrastructure).To achieve this,the study first combines RGB(red,green blue)composition and supervised classification for flood detection to monitor and map flood inundation areas.Second,it manages a multiscenario simulation and evaluates the cascading effects on HEST infrastructure.Diverse open-source data are employed,including Sentinel-1 synthetic aperture radar(SAR)data and Landsat-8 OIL data,point-of-interest(POI)and OpenStreetMap(OSM)data.The study reveals that this extreme flood event has profoundly affected croplands and villagers.Due to the revisiting period of Sentinel-1 SAR data,four scenarios are simulated to portray the retreated but‘omitted’floodwater:Scenario 0 is the flood inundation area on 27 July,and Scenarios 1,2 and 3 are built based on this information with a buffer of 50,100 and 150 m outwards,respectively.In the four scenarios,as the inundation areas expand,the affected HEST infrastructure becomes more clustered at the centre of the core study area,indicating that those located in the urban centre are more susceptible to flooding.Furthermore,the affected transport facilities assemble in the north and east of the core study area,implying that transport facilities located in the north and east of the core study area are more susceptible to flooding.The verification of the flood inundation maps and affected HEST infrastructure in the scenario simulation support the series method adopted in this study.The findings of this study can be used by flood managers,urban planners and other decision makers to better understand extreme historic weather events in China,improve flood resilience and decrease the negative impacts of such events on HEST infrastructure.

Extreme precipitation events in East China and associated moisture transport pathways

Interannual variation of summer precipitation in East China, and frequency of rainstorms during the monsoon season from 1961 to 2010, are analyzed in this study. It is found that the two variables show opposite trends on a decadal time scale: frequency of rainstorms increases significantly after the 1990 s, while summer precipitation in East China decreases during the same period. Analysis of the spatial distribution of summer rainstorm frequency from 1961 to 2010 indicates that it decreases from the southeast to the northwest at the east edge of the large-scale topography associated with the plateaus. Spatial distribution of rainstorms with daily rainfall greater than 50 mm is characterized by a "high in the southeast and low in the northwest" pattern, similar to the staircase distribution of the topography. However, the spatial distribution of variation in both summer precipitation and frequency of extreme rainstorms under global warming differs significantly from the three-step staircase topography. It is shown that moisture characteristics of summer precipitation and extreme rainstorms during the monsoon season in East China, including moisture transport pathways, moist flow pattern, and spatial structure of the merging area of moist flows, differ significantly. Areas of frequent rainstorms include the Yangtze River Valley and South China. Column-integrated moisture transport and its spatial structure could be summarized as a "merging" of three branches of intense moist flows from low and middle latitude oceans, and "convergence" of column-integrated moisture fluxes. The merging area for moist flow associated with rainstorms in the high frequency region is located slightly to the south of the monsoonal precipitation or non-rainstorm precipitation, with significantly strong moisture convergence. In addition, the summer moist flow pattern in East China has a great influence on the frequency of extreme rainstorms. Moisture flux vectors in the region of frequent rainstorms correspond to vortical flow pattern. A comparison of moisture flux vectors associated with non-rainstorms and rainstorms indicates that the moist vortex associated with rainstorms is smaller in size and located to the south of the precipitation maximum, while the moist vortex associated with non-rainstorms is larger and located to the north. It is shown that column-integrated moist transport vortices and the structure of moist flux convergence have significant impacts on the north-south oscillation of frequent rainstorm areas in East China, which is synchronized with the maximum vorticity of moisture transport and the minimum of convergence on the decadal time scale. Synthesis of moisture transport pathways and related circulation impacts leads to a conceptual model of moisture flow associated with rainstorms.