A51D-3065:
WRF Modeling of Synoptic Flow Cases of MATERHORN Spring Field Campaign

Friday, 19 December 2014
Zachariah Silver1, Christopher M Hocut2, Reneta Dimitrova3, Tamas Zsedrovits4, Harindra Joseph Fernando5, Yansen Wang6, Edward Creegan2, Melvin Felton6, Silvana Di Sabatino1 and Laura Leo1, (1)University of Notre Dame, Civil & Environmental Engineering & Earth Sciences, Notre Dame, IN, United States, (2)US Army Research Laboratory, White Sands Missile, NM, United States, (3)National Institute of Geophysics, Geodesy and Geography, Sofia, Bulgaria, (4)Pazmany Peter Catholic University, Faculty of Information Technology and Bionics, Budapest, Hungary, (5)Univ of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN, United States, (6)US Army Research Lab, Adelphi, MD, United States
Abstract:
A myriad of flow phenomena (mountain waves, wakes, rotors, down-slope windstorms, gap winds and barrier jets) occur when synoptic flows encounter mountainous terrain. These synoptic flows are driven by large-scale pressure gradients that are superimposed on along-valley pressure gradients produced locally by intra-valley thermal gradients. When synoptic flows encounter thermally driven valley/slope flows, the slope flows are modified or even completely erased when certain conditions are satisfied. High-resolution (500 m resolution) runs of the Advanced Research version of the Weather Research and Forecasting model (http://www.mmm.ucar.edu/wrf/users) were completed for the period of 2013 MATERHORN Spring experiment. The model performance was investigated using data taken using Doppler LiDARs and towers located in the vicinity of Granite Mountain. The model captures modification of the flow in the lee of the mountain. The quantitative comparison of the simulations to the observed data is in progress and will be completed soon.

This research was funded by Office of Naval Research Grant # N00014-11-1-0709.

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