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Ground-Zero Met-Ocean Observations and Attenuation of Wind Energy during Cyclonic Storm Hudhud


Affiliations
1 ESSO-Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services, Hyderabad 500 090, India
2 Andhra University, Visakhapatnam 530 003, India
3 Earth System Science Organisation, New Delhi 110 003, India
 

Ocean-met observations from INCOIS real-time automatic weather station on-board a ship RV Kaustubh served as strong ground truth for satellite- and modelderived forecasts during the very severe cyclonic storm Hudhud, which made a landfall at Visakhapatnam, India. The ship recorded maximum wind speed of 204 km/h (with a minimum central pressure of 945 hPa), which is the highest (lowest) ever instrumentally recorded value at a location on the Indian coastline during any cyclone. Though the global model forecasts of wind fields have shown good agreement inland, they failed in representing the reality along the coasts. Variation in wind energy from ocean towards inland suggests that it is attenuated exponentially inland (the maximum wind power density had reduced by 93,406 W/m2 at Anakapalle (~25 km) compared to the ocean, and by 7022 W/m2 at Chintapalle (~100 km inland) compared to Anakapalle). The present study reinforces the significance of having realtime near-shore ocean-met observations, and their operational usage for evaluation (assimilation) of (into) ocean-met forecast models in realtime.

Keywords

Automatic Weather Stations, Bias-Corrected Wind Forecasts, Forecast Models, Tropical Cyclones, Shipbased Observations, Wind Power Density.
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  • Ground-Zero Met-Ocean Observations and Attenuation of Wind Energy during Cyclonic Storm Hudhud

Abstract Views: 335  |  PDF Views: 158

Authors

R. Harikumar
ESSO-Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services, Hyderabad 500 090, India
T. M. Balakrishnan Nair
ESSO-Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services, Hyderabad 500 090, India
B. M. Rao
ESSO-Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services, Hyderabad 500 090, India
Rajendra Prasad
Andhra University, Visakhapatnam 530 003, India
P. Ramakrishna Phani
ESSO-Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services, Hyderabad 500 090, India
C. Nagaraju
ESSO-Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services, Hyderabad 500 090, India
M. Ramesh Kumar
ESSO-Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services, Hyderabad 500 090, India
C. Jeyakumar
ESSO-Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services, Hyderabad 500 090, India
S. S. C. Shenoi
ESSO-Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services, Hyderabad 500 090, India
Shailesh Nayak
Earth System Science Organisation, New Delhi 110 003, India

Abstract


Ocean-met observations from INCOIS real-time automatic weather station on-board a ship RV Kaustubh served as strong ground truth for satellite- and modelderived forecasts during the very severe cyclonic storm Hudhud, which made a landfall at Visakhapatnam, India. The ship recorded maximum wind speed of 204 km/h (with a minimum central pressure of 945 hPa), which is the highest (lowest) ever instrumentally recorded value at a location on the Indian coastline during any cyclone. Though the global model forecasts of wind fields have shown good agreement inland, they failed in representing the reality along the coasts. Variation in wind energy from ocean towards inland suggests that it is attenuated exponentially inland (the maximum wind power density had reduced by 93,406 W/m2 at Anakapalle (~25 km) compared to the ocean, and by 7022 W/m2 at Chintapalle (~100 km inland) compared to Anakapalle). The present study reinforces the significance of having realtime near-shore ocean-met observations, and their operational usage for evaluation (assimilation) of (into) ocean-met forecast models in realtime.

Keywords


Automatic Weather Stations, Bias-Corrected Wind Forecasts, Forecast Models, Tropical Cyclones, Shipbased Observations, Wind Power Density.



DOI: https://doi.org/10.18520/cs%2Fv110%2Fi12%2F2245-2252