Near-equatorial Typhoon Development: Climatology and Numerical Simulations

The climatology of near-equatorial typhoons over the western-north Pacific are fully investigated using the JTWC (Joint Typhoon Warning Center) typhoon record from 1951 to 2006. The result shows that there are seasonal and decadal variations, as well as a distinctive spatial distribution, of such events. Among them, Typhoon Vamei is an example of a near-equatorial typhoon that occurred near Singapore in December of 2001. Using the WRF (Weather and Research Forecast) model, we attempt to find out how the well known "wind surge" of this event contributes to the development of Typhoon Vamei. It is found that the strong wind surge not only helps to provide advection of positive vorticity to Vamei between 800 and 500 hPa, but also increases the convective instability of the lower troposphere, and thus helps to induce convective outbreaks and rapid intensification. Furthermore, sensitivity experiments show that terrain and the land-sea distribution have very limited effects on the formation of Typhoon Vamei in the simulation, but an adequate Coriolis parameter (f) is still needed for the development of Vamei.