Tropical Cyclone Structure (TCS08) Field Experiment in the Western North Pacific during 2008

The Office of Naval Research in conjunction with the Naval Research Laboratory and the U. S. Air Force is sponsoring a major field experiment called Tropical Cyclone Structure (TCS08) during August and September 2008. The three scientific foci of the field experiment are tropical cyclone formation, structure change including intensity changes, and the processes leading to recurvature. This TCS08 will then blend into the THORPEX-Pacific Asian Campaign (T-PARC) that focuses on the extratropical transition and downstream impacts, although the Asian countries also have common interests with TCS08.

A specific focus in the formation component is the relative roles of mesoscale processes in determining the location, timing and rate of tropical cyclone formation in the monsoon trough environment of the tropical western North Pacific. The concept of operations includes localization of potential formation areas based on global models and the use of the mesoscale model for planning detailed flight patterns, perhaps also with an adjoint targeting technique. While the Air Force Reserve WC-130 is providing observations of the environment, the Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) P-3 with the ELDORA and a wind lidar will be observing the mesoscale structure. During the structure change phase, the WC-130 with the Stepped Frequency Microwave Radiometer will be monitoring the internal structure while the NRL P-3 is exploring the near-and outer-core processes hypothesized to lead to structure change. A key role of the WC-130 is to obtain large numbers of intensity measurements necessary to evaluate satellite-based techniques that are essentially unvalidated in the western North Pacific since the discontinuation of aircraft reconnaissance in 1987. The WC-130 may also have a role in making targeted observations for situations leading to recurvature-type tracks.

This presentation is intended to provide an overview of the TCS08 and set the stage for a number of other talks that describe supporting research and preliminary studies. Some of the satellite, model and targeting products that have been created to support the TCS operations will be described. These TCS08 data sets will be openly available to all researchers and collaboration is encouraged.