Jerome M. Schmidt

A Study of CINDY/DYNAMO MJO Suppressed Phase

AbstractThe diurnal variability and the environmental conditions that support the moisture resurgence of MJO events observed during the Cooperative Indian Ocean Experiment on Intraseasonal Variability (CINDY)/DYNAMO campaign in October–December 2011 are investigated using in situ observations and the cloud-resolving fully air–ocean–wave Coupled Ocean–Atmosphere Mesoscale Prediction System (COAMPS). Spectral density and wavelet analysis of the total precipitable water (TPW) constructed from the DYNAMO soundings and TRMM satellite precipitation reveal a deep layer of vapor resurgence during the observed Wheeler and Hendon real-time multivariate MJO index phases 5–8 (MJO suppressed phase), which include diurnal, quasi-2-, quasi-3–4-, quasi-6–8-, and quasi-16-day oscillations. A similar oscillatory pattern is found in the DYNAMO moorings sea surface temperature analysis, suggesting a tightly coupled atmosphere and ocean system during these periods. COAMPS hindcast focused on the 12–16 November 2011 event sugg...

Convective Cells in Altocumulus Observed with a High-Resolution Radar

AbstractVery-high-resolution Doppler radar observations are used together with aircraft measurements to document the dynamic and thermodynamic structure of a dissipating altocumulus cloud system associated with a deep virga layer. The cloud layer circulation is shown to consist of shallow vertical velocity couplets near cloud top and a series of subkilometer-scale Rayleigh–Benard-like cells that extend vertically through the depth of the cloud layer. The subcloud layer was observed to contain a number of narrow virga fall streaks that developed below the more dominant Rayleigh–Benard updraft circulations in the cloud layer. These features were discovered to be associated with kilometer-scale horizontally orientated rotor circulations that formed along the lateral flanks of the streaks collocated downdraft circulation. The Doppler analysis further reveals that a layer mean descent was present throughout both the cloud and subcloud layers. This characteristic of the circulation is analyzed with regard to th...

Assessment of Hydrometeor Collection Rates from Exact and Approximate Equations. Part I: A New Approximate Scheme

The collection equation is analyzed for the case of two spherical hydrometeors with collection efficiency unity and exponential size distributions. When the fall velocities are significantly different a more general form of the conventional Wisner approximation can be formulated. The accuracy of the new formula exceeds that of the Wisner approximation for all cases considered, except for the collection of a faster species by a slower species if the amount of the faster species is relatively small compared with that of the slower species. The exact solution of the collection equation is then rederived and cast into the form of a power series involving the ratio of the two characteristic fall velocities. It is shown that the new formulation is a first-order correction to the continuous collection equation for hydrometeors with finite diameters and fall velocities. Based on the analysis, the implications for the behavior of both the exact collection equation and its representation in numerical models are discussed.

Radar observations of individual rain drops in the free atmosphere

Atmospheric remote sensing has played a pivotal role in the increasingly sophisticated representation of clouds in the numerical models used to assess global and regional climate change. This has been accomplished because the underlying bulk cloud properties can be derived from a statistical analysis of the returned microwave signals scattered by a diverse ensemble comprised of numerous cloud hydrometeors. A new Doppler radar, previously used to track small debris particles shed from the NASA space shuttle during launch, is shown to also have the capacity to detect individual cloud hydrometeors in the free atmosphere. Similar to the traces left behind on film by subatomic particles, larger cloud particles were observed to leave a well-defined radar signature (or streak), which could be analyzed to infer the underlying particle properties. We examine the unique radar and environmental conditions leading to the formation of the radar streaks and develop a theoretical framework which reveals the regulating role of the background radar reflectivity on their observed characteristics. This main expectation from theory is examined through an analysis of the drop properties inferred from radar and in situ aircraft measurements obtained in two contrasting regions of an observed multicellular storm system. The observations are placed in context of the parent storm circulation through the use of the radar’s unique high-resolution waveforms, which allow the bulk and individual hydrometeor properties to be inferred at the same time.

Assessment of Hydrometeor Collection Rates from Exact and Approximate Equations. Part II: Numerical Bounding

Abstract Past microphysical investigations, including Part I of this study, have noted that the collection equation, when applied to the interaction between different hydrometeor species, can predict large mass transfer rates, even when an exact solution is used. The fractional depletion in a time step can even exceed unity for the collected species with plausible microphysical conditions and time steps, requiring “normalization” by a microphysical scheme. Although some of this problem can be alleviated through the use of more moment predictions and hydrometeor categories, the question as to why such “overdepletion” can be predicted in the first place remains insufficiently addressed. It is shown through both physical and conceptual arguments that the explicit time discretization of the bulk collection equation for any moment is not consistent with a quasi-stochastic view of collection. The result, under certain reasonable conditions, is a systematic overprediction of collection, which can become a seriou...

Targeted ocean sampling guidance for tropical cyclones

This paper is not subject to U.S. copyright. The definitive version was published in Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans 122 (2017): 3505–3518, doi:10.1002/2017JC012727.

Multiple and spin off initiation of atmospheric convectively coupled Kelvin waves

A novel atmospheric convectively coupled Kelvin wave trajectories database, derived from Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission precipitation data, is used to investigate initiation of sequential Kelvin wave events. Based on the analysis of beginnings of trajectories from years 1998–2012 it is shown that sequential event initiations can be divided into two distinct categories: multiple initiations and spin off initiations, both of which involve interactions with ocean surface and upper ocean temperature variability. The results of composite analysis of the 83 multiple Kelvin wave initiations show that the local thermodynamic forcing related to the diurnal sea surface temperature variability is responsible for sequential Kelvin wave development. The composite analysis of 91 spin off Kelvin wave initiations shows that the dynamic forcing is a dominant effect and the local thermodynamic forcing is secondary. Detail case studies of both multiple and spin off initiations confirm statistical analysis. A multiple initiation occurs in the presence of the high upper ocean diurnal cycle and a spin off initiation results from both dynamic and local thermodynamic processes. The dynamic forcing is related to increased wind speed and latent heat flux likely associated with an off equatorial circulation. In addition a theoretical study of the sequential Kelvin waves is performed using a shallow water model. Finally, conceptual models of these two types of initiations are proposed.

Evidence for a Nimbostratus Uncinus in a Convectively Generated Mixed-Phase Stratiform Cloud Shield

AbstractThe structure of a melting layer associated with a mesoconvective system is examined using a combination of in situ aircraft measurements and a unique Doppler radar operated by the U.S. Navy that has a range resolution as fine as 0.5 m. Interest in this case was motivated by ground-based all-sky camera images that captured the transient development of midlevel billow cloud structures within a precipitating trailing stratiform cloud shield associated with a passing deep convective system. A sequence of high-fidelity time–height radar measurements taken of this storm system reveal that the movement of the billow cloud structure over the radar site corresponded with abrupt transitions in the observed low-level precipitation structure. Of particular note is an observed transition from stratiform to more periodic and vertically slanted rain shaft structures that both radar and aircraft measurements indicate have the same temporal periodicity determined to arise visually between successive billow cloud ...