Development of the Coupled Northwest Atlantic Prediction System (CNAPS)

A 3-dimensioanl marine environmental nowcast/forecast system has been constructed and is running quasi-operationally for the Northwest Atlantic Ocean. This fully coupled modeling accounts for the interactions among Ocean, Atmosphere, Wave, Sediment Transport and the low-trophic marine ecosystem. It is driven by realistic meteorological boundary forcing, tides, river, and deep-ocean boundary conditions provided by a data assimilative global ocean model. Model output from this nowcast/forecast system, including marine weather, ocean wave, ocean circulation and marine ecosystem variable are generated daily and available for public access. The construction of this prediction system, model validations and case studies on air-sea interactions during major tropical and extratropical storms will be discussed in this presentation.