Air-sea heat fluxes in the stratocumulus deck / cold tongue / ITCZ complex of the eastern tropical Pacific

The Eastern Pacific Investigation of Climate Processes (EPIC) experiment was designed to improve understanding of the intertropical convergence zone (ITCZ), its interactions with the cold tongue of water that extends along the equator, and the physics of the stratocumulus cloud deck that forms over the cool waters off South America. In this presentation, we analyze the structure and evolution of the air-sea heat fluxes and their relation to underlying sea surface temperature and overlying clouds within the stratocumulus deck / cold tongue / ITCZ complex. The primary data used in the analysis are from the EPIC enhanced monitoring array that includes an IMET mooring at 20S, 85W in the stratocumulus region, 10 enhanced Tropical Atmosphere and Ocean (TAO) moorings along 95W from 8S to 12N, and surface flux and boundary layer data collected from the TAO tender ship which visited the 95W moorings at 6 monthly intervals. Comparisons with fluxes from numerical weather products identify biases which can impact general circulation models. Careful attention is paid to the role of near surface temperature stratification, ocean currents relative to wind, and variance from mesoscale gustiness, each of which has its own structure within the stratocumulus deck / cold tongue / ITCZ complex.