An Investigation of Ocean-Atmospheric Interactions, Intensity Change and Track Prediction Associated with Tropical Cyclone/Hurricane Activity over the Gulf of Mexico using Satellite Data and Numerical Modeling

Over the last decade, there has been an overall increase in the number of Atlantic Hurricanes and those making landfall in the United States and around the world and attributed to global warming. The 2005 hurricane season serves as a prime example with 27 named systems, three Category 5 hurricanes and unprecedented loss of life (>1000 fatalities) and damage (> $100 billion) in the United States. Understanding the genesis, evolution and intensity/track of tropical cyclones is limited by a shortage of observations and knowledge of key processes (atmospheric, oceanic and air-sea interactions). This research focuses on the observational and numerical investigations of the air-sea interactions, tropical cyclone intensity change and track forecast associated with landfall of tropical cyclones. Numerical model (WRF/ARW) with data assimilations have been used for this research to investigate the model’s performances on hurricane tracks and intensities associated with the hurricane Katrina, which began to strengthen until reaching Category 5 on 28 August 2005. The model have been run on a doubly nested domain centered over the central Gulf of Mexico, with grid spacing of 90 km and 30 km for 6 hr periods, from August 28th to August 30th. We compared model output with the observations and the model is capable of simulating the surface features, intensity change and track associated with hurricane Katrina. The preliminary result shows that ARW has the best skill in hurricane intensity and tracking. We further investigate more parameter comparisons including precipitation variability, heat flux and high winds.