Application of Direct Assimilation of ATOVS Microwave Radiances to Typhoon Track Prediction

In order to solve the difficult problem of typhoon track prediction due to the sparsity of conventional data over the tropical ocean, in this paper, the No. 0205 typhoon Rammasun of 4-6 July 2002 is studied and an experiment of the typhoon track prediction is made with the direct use of the Advanced TIROS-N Operational Vertical Sounder (ATOVS) microwave radiance data in three-dimensional variational data assimilation. The prediction result shows that the experiment with the ATOVS microwave radiance data can not only successfully predict the observed fact that typhoon Rammasun moves northward and turns right, but can also simulate the action of the fast movement of the typhoon, which cannot be simulated with only conventional radiosonde data. The skill of the typhoon track prediction with the ATOVS microwave radiance data is much better than that without the ATOVS data. The typhoon track prediction of the former scheme is consistent in time and in location with the observation. The direct assimilation of ATOVS microwave radiance data is an available way to solve the problem of the sparse observation data over the tropical ocean, and has great potential in being applied to typhoon track prediction.

THE IMPACT OF CUMULUS PARAMETERIZATIONS AND MICROPHYSICS SCHEMES UNDER DIFFERENT COMBINATIONS ON TYPHOON TRACK PREDICTION

This study examines the effects of cumulus parameterizations and microphysics schemes on the track forecast of typhoon Nabi using the Weather Research Forecast model. The study found that the effects of cumulus parameterizations on typhoon track forecast were comparatively strong and the typhoon track forecast of Kain-Fritsch (KF) was superior to that of Betts-Miller (BM). When KF was selected, the simulated results would be improved if microphysics schemes were selected than otherwise. The results from Ferrier, WSM6, and Lin were very close to those in the best track. KF performed well with the simulations of the western extension and eastern contraction changes of a North Pacific high as well as the distribution and strength of the typhoon wind field.

TYPHOON TRACK PREDICTION EXPERIMENTS USING T_(106)L_(19)

A series of 96-h typhoon track prediction experiments were carried out using medium range forecasting system of NMC by adding BOGUS typhoon (simplified as B-TC) into the first guess field or the analysis field in order to provide longer time typhoon track forecast. The results show that T106L19 could provide a better forecast to typhoon tracks when the B-TC was added, especially when the typhoon vortex is even weaker. The sensitive experiments on where to add the B-TC show that the results from adding the B-TC into the first guess field are better. The results also show that the initialization smoothes the B-TC a lot and this will affect the typhoon track prediction.