Assimilation of HY-2A scatterometer sea surface wind data in a 3DVAR data assimilation system–A case study of Typhoon Bolaven

Abstract

The scatterometer (SCAT) on-board China’s HY-2A satellite has the capability to provide high resolution wind vector information over the global ocean surface. These wind vector data produced by the HY-2A scatterometer (HY-2A SCAT) are available to the data assimilation system with real-time information of high accuracy. In this paper, two experiments are designed to investigate the impact of HY-2A SCAT data in the three-dimensional variational assimilation system for the Weather Research and Forecast model (WRF 3DVAR). The powerful Typhoon Bolaven, which struck South Korea in August 2012, is selected for this case study. The results clearly demonstrate that HY-2A SCAT data can effectively complement the scarce observations over the ocean surface and improve the prediction of the wind and pressure fields of a typhoon. The case study of Typhoon Bolaven exhibits the significant and positive impact of HY-2A SCAT data on the numerical prediction of the tropical cyclone track.

Keywords

HY-2A / scatterometer / data assimilation / sea surface wind / 3DVAR

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Acknowledgments

This study was supported by the Special Scientific Research Project for Public Interest (GYHY201006015), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 41375113 and 41228007). The HY-2A wind speed products are obtained from the Chinese National Satellite Ocean Application Service (http://www.nsoas.gov.cn/NSOAS_En/index.html). The buoy wind data are downloaded from the NOAA/NDBC website (www.ndbc.noaa.gov).

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