Author: Jeremy McGibbonPublisher:
ISBN:
Category : Cumulus
Languages : en
Pages : 49
Book Description
During the Marine ARM GPCI Investigation of Clouds (MAGIC) in Oct. 2011 - Sept. 2012, a container ship making periodic cruises between Los Angeles, CA and Honolulu, HI was instrumented with surface meteorological, aerosol and radiation instruments, a cloud radar and ceilometer, and radiosondes. Here, large-eddy simulation (LES) is performed in a ship-following frame of reference for 13 4-day transects from the MAGIC field campaign. The goal is to assess if LES can skillfully simulate the broad range of observed cloud characteristics and boundary layer structure across the subtropical stratocumulus to cumulus transition region sampled during different seasons and meteorological conditions. Results from Leg 15A, which sampled a particularly well-defined stratocumulus to cumulus transition, demonstrate the approach. The LES reproduces the observed timing of decoupling and transition from stratocumulus to cumulus, and matches the observed evolution of boundary-layer structure, cloud fraction, liquid water path, and precipitation statistics remarkably well. Considering the simulations of all 13 cruises, the LES skillfully simulates the mean diurnal variation of key measured quantities, including liquid water path (LWP), cloud fraction, measures of decoupling and cloud radar-derived precipitation. The daily mean quantities are well-represented, and daily mean LWP and cloud fraction and show the expected correlation with estimated inversion strength. There is a -0.6 K low bias in LES near-surface air temperature that results in a high bias of 5.7 W m^-2 in sensible heat flux (SHF). Overall, these results build confidence in the ability of LES to represent the northeast Pacific stratocumulus to trade cumulus transition region.
