The mutual evolution of mountain waves and katabatic flow
- Los Alamos National Lab., NM (United States)
- Colorado State Univ., Fort Collins, CO (United States)
Typically, katabatic flows have been studied in their least complicated or idealized state. Further, these flows are generally regarded as having simple forcing and non-turbulent structure due to the strong atmospheric stability they are bedded within. Somewhat analogously, mountain waves and their effects have been mostly studied in their idealized state, i.e. for constant upstream flow and stability. Even in the numerous cases where these two atmospheric phenomena have been studied in their realistic state, seldom has their mutual interaction been considered. One exception that includes numerical modeling is Gross (1990). The express purpose of this work is to examine how each of these phenomena interact with each other in an evolving nocturnal atmosphere. This work is motivated by observations from the Atmospheric Studies in Complex Terrain (ASCOT) Program which clearly indicate non-idealized behavior in katabatic flows. Although numerous idealized simulations were also completed, discussion here focuses on the most realistic simulations of the case night 3--4 September 1993. This night was dominated by clear skies and light near surface winds. A high pressure system to the southwest of Colorado caused northwesterly flow at {approximately} 7 m s{sup {minus}1} upstream of the Rockies with a Froude number of 0.45 overnight. ASCOT observations indicated that katabatic and mountain wave flow were occurring.
- Research Organization:
- Los Alamos National Lab. (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE, Washington, DC (United States)
- DOE Contract Number:
- W-7405-ENG-36
- OSTI ID:
- 266675
- Report Number(s):
- LA-UR-96-1438; CONF-9609170-1; ON: DE96010494; TRN: AHC29616%%72
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: 7. conference on mesoscale processes, Reading (United Kingdom), 9-13 Sep 1996; Other Information: PBD: [1996]
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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