Highly resolved observations and simulations of the ocean response to a hurricane

View/ Open
Date
2007-07-07Author
Sanford, Thomas B.
Concept link
Price, James F.
Concept link
Girton, James B.
Concept link
Webb, Douglas C.
Concept link
Metadata
Show full item recordCitable URI
https://hdl.handle.net/1912/3342As published
https://doi.org/10.1029/2007GL029679DOI
10.1029/2007GL029679Keyword
Hurricane-ocean interaction; Wind stress and inertial motions; Hurricane wake; Numerical upper ocean model; Instruments and methodsAbstract
An autonomous, profiling float called EM-APEX was developed to provide a quantitative and comprehensive description of the ocean side of hurricane-ocean interaction. EM-APEX measures temperature, salinity and pressure to CTD quality and relative horizontal velocity with an electric field sensor. Three prototype floats were air-deployed into the upper ocean ahead of Hurricane Frances (2004). All worked properly and returned a highly resolved description of the upper ocean response to a category 4 hurricane. At a float launched 55 km to the right of the track, the hurricane generated large amplitude, inertially rotating velocity in the upper 120 m of the water column. Coincident with the hurricane passage there was intense vertical mixing that cooled the near surface layer by about 2.2°C. We find consistent model simulations of this event provided the wind stress is computed from the observed winds using a high wind-speed saturated drag coefficient.
Description
Author Posting. © American Geophysical Union, 2007. This article is posted here by permission of American Geophysical Union for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Geophysical Research Letters 34 (2007): L13604, doi:10.1029/2007GL029679.
Collections
Suggested Citation
Geophysical Research Letters 34 (2007): L13604Related items
Showing items related by title, author, creator and subject.
-
Impacts of oceanic mixed layer on hurricanes: a simulation experiment with Hurricane Sandy
Li, Siqi; Chen, Changsheng; Wu, Zhongxiang; Beardsley, Robert C.; Li, Ming (American Geophysical Union, 2020-10-07)Influences of the ocean mixed layer (OML) dynamics on intensity, pathway, and landfall of October 2012 Hurricane Sandy were examined through an experiment using the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model. The WRF ... -
The CBLAST-Hurricane program and the next-generation fully coupled atmosphere–wave–ocean models for hurricane research and prediction
Chen, Shuyi S.; Zhao, Wei; Donelan, Mark A.; Price, James F.; Walsh, Edward J. (American Meteorological Society, 2007-03)The record-setting 2005 hurricane season has highlighted the urgent need for a better understanding of the factors that contribute to hurricane intensity, and for the development of corresponding advanced hurricane ... -
Metrics of hurricane-ocean interaction : vertically-integrated or vertically-averaged ocean temperature?
Price, James F. (Copernicus Publications on behalf of the European Geosciences Union, 2009-05-05)The ocean thermal field is often represented in hurricane-ocean interaction by a metric termed upper Ocean Heat Content (OHC), the vertical integral of ocean temperature in excess of 26°C. High values of OHC have proven ...