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Antarctic Forecasting - A Practitioner’s View

Antarctic Forecasting - A Practitioner’s View. LT CDR Matt Ruglys RNZN Joint METOC HQJFNZ. My background. Joined the Royal Navy in 1981 METOC training 1990 METOC, HMS ENDURANCE 1991-1993 Two deployments to the Antarctic Peninsula MetService NZ 2007-2010

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Antarctic Forecasting - A Practitioner’s View

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  1. Antarctic Forecasting -A Practitioner’s View LT CDR Matt Ruglys RNZN Joint METOC HQJFNZ

  2. My background • Joined the Royal Navy in 1981 • METOC training 1990 • METOC, HMS ENDURANCE 1991-1993 • Two deployments to the Antarctic Peninsula • MetService NZ 2007-2010 • Joined Royal New Zealand Navy 2010 • METOC in HMNZS OTAGO Nov 2013-Jan 2014 • Deployment to the Ross Sea

  3. A tale of two ships • HMS ENDURANCE • Ice class 1A1 (DNV) • Displacement 6100t • LOA 91m • Beam 17.9m • Draught 8.5m • HMNZS OTAGO • Ice class 1C (Lloyds) • Displacement 1900t • LOA 85m • Beam 14m • Draught 3.6m

  4. Challenges • Sparsityof surface observations • Even greater sparsityof upper air observations • Hence the determination of current weather conditions and the spatial distribution of weather elements (fronts, air masses and so on) is difficult

  5. Surface observations

  6. Surface Observations

  7. Radiosonde observations

  8. Satellite Imagery • Satellite imagery is essential to fill in the gaps in observations • Geostationary satellites do not cover polar regions • Polar orbiting satellites have better resolution than geostationary satellites • Generating a time sequence is not really possible

  9. Geostationary Satellite Imagery

  10. Polar Orbiting Satellite Imagery

  11. Hand Analysis

  12. Data & Communications • Internet via satellite • Slow, thus file size is important • Chose NAVGEM over GFS or AMPS • AMPS D3 (Ross Sea) • MSLP and 10m u and v winds – 46MB • NAVGEM Global (Ross Sea) • MSLP and 10m u and v winds – 1.8MB

  13. Orography • Orography has a powerful modifying effect on the airflow • Trans-Antarctic mountains and high ground to the west of the Ross Sea • Barrier winds

  14. Orography Contours in metres. From: Parish, TR; Cassano, JJ; Seefeldt, MW; Characteristics of the Ross Ice Shelf air stream as depicted in Antarctic Mesoscale Prediction System simulations; J Geophys Res III D12109, doi:10.1029/2005JD006185

  15. NAVGEM (0.5°)

  16. NAVGEM (0.5°)

  17. AMPS D3 (3.3km)

  18. AMPS D3 (3.3km)

  19. Barrier wind – theory to practice

  20. Katabatic winds • Boundary layer very strong temperate inversions • Katabatic winds can be very extreme, reaching storm force or greater at times • Develop at very short notice • Strongly channelled by local topography • Local weather conditions can change dramatically over very short space and time scales • Katabatic flows can be associated with very turbulent conditions, rapid temperature changes, and often very poor visibility in blowing snow

  21. IR image showing katabatic drainage (dark signature & yellow arrows). Red areas show polynyas (ice-free areas) formed where strong offshore winds blow

  22. Advection Fog

  23. Advection Fog • Relatively straightforward • Air temperature • Dewpoint • Sea surface temperature

  24. Boundary Layer • The boundary layer can be difficult for both man and machine

  25. Ross Island - FEW

  26. Ross Island - FEW

  27. AMPS D5 (1.1km) – cloud fraction

  28. Ross Island - BKN

  29. Ross Island - BKN

  30. Human Forecasters • Because of the • topography • land surface • lower atmospheric flows • relative lack of good surface weather observations • The meteorologist is an even more important component of the forecasting system than s/he would be in other locations • But even they will get caught out

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