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Forcing Mechanisms For Washoe Zephyr - A Daytime Downslope Wind Phenomenon In The Great Basin East Of The Sierra Nevada, Shiyuan Zhong, Ju Li, Craig Clements, Stephan Dewekker, Xindi Bian

Faculty Publications, Meteorology and Climate Science

This paper investigates the formation mechanisms for a local wind phenomenon known as Washoe Zephyr that occurs frequently in the lee of the Sierra Nevada. Unlike the typical thermally driven slope flows with upslope wind during daytime and downslope at night, the Washoe Zephyr winds blow down the lee slopes of the Sierra Nevada in the afternoon against the local pressure gradient. Long-term hourly surface wind data from several stations on the eastern slope of the Sierra Nevada and rawinsonde sounding data in the region are analyzed and numerical simulations are performed to test the suggested hypotheses on the formation …