Meteorology Commons^™

Distributions Of Ice Supersaturation And Ice Crystals From Airborne Observations In Relation To Upper Tropospheric Dynamical Boundaries, Minghui Diao, Jorgen Jensen, Laura Pan, Cameron Homeyer, Shawn Honomichl, James Bresch, Aaron Bansemer

Faculty Publications, Meteorology and Climate Science

Ice supersaturation (ISS) is the prerequisite condition for cirrus cloud formation. To examine multiscale dynamics' influences on ISS formation, we analyze in situ aircraft observations (~200 m scale) over North America in coordinates relative to dynamical boundaries in the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere. Two case studies demonstrate that ISS formation is likely influenced by mesoscale uplifting, small-scale waves, and turbulence. A collective analysis of 15 flights in April–June 2008 shows that the top layers of ISS and ice crystal distributions are strongly associated with thermal tropopause height. In addition, the average occurrence frequencies of ISS and ice crystals on …

Springtime Melt Onset On Arctic Sea Ice From Satellite Observations And Related Atmospheric Conditions, Angela C. Bliss

Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The timing of snowmelt onset (MO) on Arctic sea ice derived from passive microwave satellite data is examined by determining the melting area (in km²) on a daily basis for the spring and summer melt season months over the 1979 – 2012 data record. The date of MO on Arctic sea ice has important implications for the amount of total solar energy absorbed by the ice-ocean system in a given year. Increasingly early mean MO dates have been recorded over the 34-year data record as evidenced by statistically significant trends of 6.6 days decade^-1 over the extent …

Quantifying The Sensitivity Of Maximum, Limiting, And Potential Tropical Cyclone Intensity To Sst: Observations Versus The Fsu/ Coaps Global Climate Model, Sarah Strazzo, James Elsner, Tim Larow

Publications

No abstract provided.

Comparing The Model-Simulated Global Warming Signal To Observations Using Empirical Estimates Of Unforced Noise, Patrick T. Brown, Wenhong Li, Eugene C. Cordero, Steven A. Mauget

Faculty Publications, Meteorology and Climate Science

The comparison of observed global mean surface air temperature (GMT) change to the mean change simulated by climate models has received much public and scientific attention. For a given global warming signal produced by a climate model ensemble, there exists an envelope of GMT values representing the range of possible unforced states of the climate system (the Envelope of Unforced Noise; EUN). Typically, the EUN is derived from climate models themselves, but climate models might not accurately simulate the correct characteristics of unforced GMT variability. Here, we simulate a new, empirical, EUN that is based on instrumental and reconstructed surface …

Drougthscape, Spring 2015, Kelly Smith

DroughtScape: Quarterly Newsletter of the National Drought Mitigation Center (2007–2023)

Contents

Director’s column.

South Plains ranch workshops 3

First quarter drought summary

First quarter impacts summary

Gary’s favorite pond, D1-4

NDMC’s Haigh leads U2U pubs

SW Montana watersheds convene

Wind River monitors drought

Morocco’s new drought index

Northeast Brazil drought monitoring

EU’s drought initiative

U.S. Drought Monitor Forum

How Colorado tourism coped in 2012

Umphlett Qci March 2015, Natalie Umphlett

High Plains Regional Climate Center: Staff Publications

Highlights for the Basin

Temperature and Precipitation Anomalies

Mountain Snowpack

Agriculture

Recreation and Tourism

Forestry

Drought Impacts Continue

3-Month Precipitation and Temperature Outlooks

U.S. Seasonal Drought Outlook

Global Warming And Population Responses Among Great Plains Birds, Paul A. Johnsgard

Zea E-Books Collection

Based on an analysis of 47 years (1967–2014) of Audubon Christmas Bird Counts (CBC), evidence for population changes and shifts in early winter (late December) ranges of nearly 150 species of birds in the Great Plains states is summarized, a region defined as including the Dakotas, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, and the Texas panhandle. The rationale for this study had its origins in Terry Root’s 1988 Atlas of North American Wintering Birds. Root’s landmark study provided a baseline for evaluating the nationwide winter distributions of 253 North American birds in the mid-20th century, using data from the National Audubon Society’s …

The Storm Surge Hazard, Jeff Orrock

January 23, 2015: Storm Surge Modeling Tools for Planning and Response

No abstract provided.

Introduction To Storm Surge Modeling, Rick Luettich

January 23, 2015: Storm Surge Modeling Tools for Planning and Response

No abstract provided.

A One Year Landsat 8 Conterminous United States Study Of Cirrus And Non-Cirrus Clouds, Valeriy Kovalskyy, David P. Roy

GSCE Faculty Publications

The first year of available Landsat 8 data over the conterminous United States (CONUS), composed of 11,296 acquisitions sensed over more than 11 thousand million 30 m pixel locations, was analyzed comparing the spatial and temporal incidence of 30 m cloud and cirrus states available in the standard Landsat 8 Level 1 product suite. This comprehensive data analysis revealed that on average over a year of CONUS observations (i) 35.9% were detected with high confidence cloud, with spatio-temporal patterns similar to those observed by previous Landsat 5 and 7 cloud analyses; (ii) 28.2% were high confidence cirrus; (iii) 20.1% were …

Perspectivas Culturais Na Comunicação Climática (Cultural Perspectives On Climate Communication), Karen E. Pennesi

Anthropology Publications

Este artigo considera que a previsão climática deve ser interpretada dentro de contextos sociais, culturais e linguísticos. Dentro de uma perspectiva antropológica baseada em entrevistas, observações e um questionário, será investigado como mudanças no meio-ambiente são entendidas por diferentes indivíduos, e transformadas em previsões que são comunicadas a diversos públicos. A linguagem utilizada e a maneira como a previsão é comunicada depende da experiência e dos objetivos do previsor, enquanto que a interpretação e a avaliação da previsão por outros são influenciadas por seus diferentes objetivos, atitudes, conhecimento e práticas. Esta etnografia da comunicação enfatiza o processo da comunicação das …

Drougthscape, Winter 2015, Kelly Smith

DroughtScape: Quarterly Newsletter of the National Drought Mitigation Center (2007–2023)

Contents

Director’s report

Central U.S. 2012 report

October-December drought summary

2014 drought summary

Caribbean capacity building

Drought impacts in 2014

California timeline 2014

UC Davis ranching workshop

NASA SMAP data

Global drought info system

Community Capitals

Evaluation and assessment

Indicator-impact research

NDMC on YouTube

A Fast Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite Simulator For Cloudy Atmospheres, Chao Liu, Ping Yang, Steven Platnick, Kerry G. Meyer, Chenxi Wang, Shouguo Ding

Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences: Faculty Publications

A fast instrument simulator is developed to simulate the observations made in cloudy atmospheres by the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS). The correlated k distribution technique is used to compute the transmissivities associated with absorbing atmospheric gases. The bulk scattering properties of ice clouds are based on the ice model used for the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer Collection 6 ice cloud products, and those ofwater clouds are computedwith the Lorenz-Mie theory. Two fast radiative transfer models based on precomputed ice cloud look-up tables are used for the VIIRS solar and infrared channels. The accuracy and efficiency of the fast …

The Gravity Environment Of Zhouqu Debris Flow Of August 2010 And Its Implication For Future Recurrence, Diandong Ren, Lance M. Leslie, Xinyi Shen, Yang Hong, Qingyun Duan, Rezaul Mahmood, Yun Li, Gang Huang, Weidong Guo, Mervyn J. Lynch

High Plains Regional Climate Center: Staff Publications

This study investigates the geological background of the August 7-8, 2010 Zhouqu debris flows in the northwestern Chinese province of Gansu, and possible future occurrence of such hazards in the peri-Tibetan Plateau (TP) regions. Debris flows are a more predictable type of landslide because of its strong correlation with extreme precipitation. However, two factors affecting the frequency and magnitude of debris flows: very fine scale precipitation and degree of fracture of bedrock, both defy direct observations. Annual mean Net Primary production (NPP) is used as a surrogate for regional precipitation with patchiness filtered out, and gravity satellite measured regional mass …

Development Of A Long-Term (1884-2006) Serially Complete Dataset Of U.S. Temperatures And Precipitation For Climate Services, Jinshing You, Kenneth G. Hubbard, Martha Shulski, Mark D. Svoboda, Michael J. Hayes

High Plains Regional Climate Center: Staff Publications

Serially complete climate datasets with no missing data are necessary for a diverse group of users working in many economic sectors. In this article we describe the procedures used to create a Serially Complete Data set (SCD) for the U.S. We include the selection criterion applied to potential SCD stations, the various procedural steps and the details applied to each step. A few observations that were not previously digitized were obtained from observers official paper reports. The methods used to estimate missing data are the Spatial Regression Test and the Inverse Distance Weighting technique. Using the criterion for selecting stations …

A Historical Perspective On Nebraska’S Variable And Changing Climate, Martha Shulski, William Baule, Crystal J. Stiles, Natalie A. Umphlett

High Plains Regional Climate Center: Staff Publications

Nebraska is situated at the intersection of the northern and southern Great Plains, exhibiting a dramatic longitudinal gradient for precipitation and humidity, and benefiting from groundwater resources. The continental climate is highly variable temporally both for temperature and precipitation. Our assessment of long-term meteorological observations shows that over the last century the annual average temperature in Nebraska has warmed approximately 0.6°C, which is similar to the increase in the global average temperature over the same time period. Furthermore, we found minimum temperatures have warmed more than maximum temperatures, and winter and spring show the strongest warming. We found no significant …

Effects Of Climate Oscillations On Wind Resource Variability In The United States, B. D. Hamlington, P. E. Hamlington, S. G. Collins, S. R. Alexander, K.-Y. Kim

CCPO Publications

Natural climate variations in the United States wind resource are assessed by using cyclostationary empirical orthogonal functions (CSEOFs) to decompose wind reanalysis data. Compared to approaches that average climate signals or assume stationarity of the wind resource on interannual time scales, the CSEOF analysis isolates variability associated with specific climate oscillations, as well as their modulation from year to year. Contributions to wind speed variability from the modulated annual cycle (MAC) and the El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) are quantified, and information provided by the CSEOF analysis further allows the spatial variability of these effects to be determined. The impacts of …

A Southern Hemisphere Sea Level Pressure-Based Precursor For Enso Warm And Cold Events, B. D. Hamlington, R. F. Milliff, H. Van Loon, K.-Y. Kim

CCPO Publications

Past studies have described large-scale sea level pressure (SLP) variations in the Southern Hemisphere that lead to El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) warm and cold events (WE and CE). By relying on this description and the importance of the related variability in the lead up to WE and CE, Southern Hemisphere SLP variations in May-June-July (MJJ) are shown here to be excellent predictors for the peak warm/cold events in sea-surface temperatures (SST) and sea level pressure that mark the mature phase of a warm/cold event in November-January of the same year. Cyclostationary empirical orthogonal functions (CSEOFs) are used to extract the …

Characterization Of Tropical Clouds Using Multi-Satellite Observations, Ricardo Anderson

Dissertations and Theses

Clouds an important component of the earth-climate system and play a critical role in affecting energy and water cycle of the planet. In particular, tropical convective clouds account for the majority of the precipitation that fall on the Earth's surface. Multiple active satellite missions in recent decade such as TRMM (Tropical Rainfall Measurement Mission), and CloudSat have provided fruitful new insight into the internal structures of these tropical convective clouds. In conjunction with cloud data from ISCCP (International Satellite Cloud Climatology Project), that is based passive remote sensing technology in the visible and infrared spectrum, this allows for a more …

Intra- And Inter-Seasonal Variability Of Supra-Glacial 1 Streams And Lakes Over The West Greenland Ice Sheet 2 From High-Resolution Satellite Optical Data, Michael Gregory Brown

Dissertations and Theses

The Greenland ice sheet (GrIS) is one of the largest glacial ice masses on Earth, second only to the Antarctic ice sheet. The surface hydrology of the GrIS plays a crucial role on the surface energy and mass balance budgets of the ice sheet as a whole. Surface water, known as supra-glacial water, is seasonally found in the ablation zone and feeds the en-glacial and sub-glacial hydrological environments of the ice sheet. The spatial distribution of surface streams is poorly understood and their temporal variability is (to our knowledge) unknown. One of the reasons for the lack of knowledge on …

The Simulation & Evaluation Of Surge Hazard Using A Response Surface Method In The New York Bight, Michael H. Bredesen

UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Atmospheric features, such as tropical cyclones, act as a driving mechanism for many of the major hazards affecting coastal areas around the world. Accurate and efficient quantification of tropical cyclone surge hazard is essential to the development of resilient coastal communities, particularly given continued sea level trend concerns. Recent major tropical cyclones that have impacted the northeastern portion of the United States have resulted in devastating flooding in New York City, the most densely populated city in the US. As a part of national effort to re-evaluate coastal inundation hazards, the Federal Emergency Management Agency used the Joint Probability Method …

Distributions Of Ice Supersaturation And Ice Crystals From Airborne Observations In Relation To Upper Tropospheric Dynamical Boundaries, Minghui Diao, Jorgen Jensen, Laura Pan, Cameron Homeyer, Shawn Honomichl, James Bresch, Aaron Bansemer, Eric Jensen

Faculty Publications, Meteorology and Climate Science

Cirrus clouds are one of the largest sources of uncertainties in predicting future climate. Ice nucleation and ice crystal growth inside cirrus clouds require ice supersaturation (ISS). Previously, remote sensing observations have shown that the locations of cirrus clouds’ cloud top height are highly correlated with the thermal tropopause height (Pan and Munchak, 2011). However, it is unclear if the initial conditions of cirrus clouds – ice supersaturated region (ISSRs) – have similar features in the extratropical upper troposphere and lower stratosphere (UT/LS). In fact, the dynamical processes and conditions that contribute to ISS formation from the microscale (~100 m) …

Long Term Ground Based Precipitation Data Analysis: Spatial And Temporal Variability, Luciano Rodriguez, Cyril S. Rakovski, Hesham El-Askary, Mohamed Allali

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

California is an area of diverse topography and has what many scientists call a Mediterranean climate. Various precipitation patterns exist due to El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) which can cause abnormal precipitation or droughts. As temperature increases mainly due to the increase of CO2 in the atmosphere, it is rapidly changing the climate of not only California but the world. An increase in temperature is leading to droughts in certain areas as other areas are experiencing heavy rainfall/flooding. Droughts in return are providing a foundation for fires harming the ecosystem and nearby population. Various natural hazards can be induced due …

Optimal Ranking Regime Analysis Of Intra- To Multidecadal U.S. Climate Variability. Part I: Temperature, Eugene C. Cordero, Steven A. Mauget

Faculty Publications, Meteorology and Climate Science

The optimal ranking regime (ORR) method was used to identify intradecadal to multidecadal (IMD) time windows containing significant ranking sequences in U.S. climate division temperature data. The simplicity of the ORR procedure’s output—a time series’ most significant nonoverlapping periods of high or low rankings—makes it possible to graphically identify common temporal breakpoints and spatial patterns of IMD variability in the analyses of 102 climate division temperature series. This approach is also applied to annual Atlantic multidecadal oscillation (AMO) and Pacific decadal oscillation (PDO) climate indices, a Northern Hemisphere annual temperature (NHT) series, and divisional annual and seasonal temperature data during …

Optimal Ranking Regime Analysis Of Intra- To Multidecadal U.S. Climate Variability. Part Ii: Precipitation And Streamflow, Steven A. Mauget, Eugene C. Cordero

Faculty Publications, Meteorology and Climate Science

In Part I of this paper, the optimal ranking regime (ORR) method was used to identify intradecadal to multidecadal (IMD) regimes in U.S. climate division temperature data during 1896–2012. Here, the method is used to test for annual and seasonal precipitation regimes during that same period. Water-year mean streamflow rankings at 125 U.S. Hydro-Climatic Data Network gauge stations are also evaluated during 1939–2011. The precipitation and streamflow regimes identified are compared with ORR-derived regimes in the Pacific decadal oscillation (PDO), the Atlantic multidecadal oscillation (AMO), and indices derived from gridded SST anomaly (SSTA) analysis data. Using a graphic display approach …

Umphlett Qci Dec 2014, Natalie A. Umphlett

High Plains Regional Climate Center: Staff Publications

Highlights for the Basin

Temperature and Precipitation Anomalies

Drought Conditions

Agriculture

Horticulture

Recreation and Tourism

3-Month Precipitation and Temperature Outlooks

Soil Moisture Conditions

Challenges Associated With Space Weather Analysis And Prediction, John Lanicci

Space Traffic Management Conference

The term “space weather” is typically used to describe environmental conditions in the region extending from the sun’s surface, through the interplanetary medium, to the earth’s magnetic field and upper atmosphere, with a focus on those conditions that can affect the earth, its technological systems, and population. Space weather conditions are monitored continuously by a number of agencies around the world. These agencies use both satellite- and ground-based measurements to build analyses and employ predictive models that form the basis for impacts-based products dealing with myriad users in satellite operations, the utility industry, aviation, and satellite-based communications, to name a …

Droughtscape, Fall 2014, Kelly Smith

DroughtScape: Quarterly Newsletter of the National Drought Mitigation Center (2007–2023)

Contents

Director’s report

Upcoming events

Drought and climate summary

Drought impacts

Drought planning in Brazil

Ethiopian workshop

Visiting scholar

Help for South Plains ranchers

Wind River tribal workshop

Inter Tribal Buffalo Council

South Dakota ranch workshops

Umphlett Qci Sept 2014, Natalie Umphlett

High Plains Regional Climate Center: Staff Publications

Highlights for the Basin

Temperature and Precipitation Anomalies

􏰞􏰥􏰬􏰨􏰤􏰵􏰶􏰫Streamflow

Long-term Impacts of Drought

Cool, Wet Summer Benefits

Heavy Precipitation Impacts the Missouri River and its Tributaries

3-Month Precipitation and Temperature Outlooks

Soil Moisture Conditions

Climate Study In An Abandoned Auto Tunnel In Alaska, Usa, Andreas Pflitsch, David Holmgren

The International Workshop on Ice Caves

An abandoned auto tunnel in south central Alaska in an elevation of 118 m above sea level seemed to be a perfect laboratory for studying the evolution of ice speleothems in a yearly cycle. More than 1,500 ice forms like stalagmites, stalactites, columns in various shape and arrangements, developed in just 2 month to a high up to 6 meters and lasted for another 5 to 6 month. In October just the remains of the melted ice in rings and rectangular patterns of a white powder could be found. Unfortunately the mostly sealed tunnel was opened in January 2014 by …