Identical twin experiments with and without topography are conducted with the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model in an idealized framework to investigate the impact of topography on the initial error growth associated with moist convection. A topography is set as a single Gaussian shape mountain with a peak height of about 1000 m. Both experiments show clear diurnal cycles, while moist convection

Torrential rain associated with Typhoon Hagibis (2019) caused extensive destruction across Japan. To project future changes of the record-breaking rainfall, numerical experiments using a regional 1-km-mesh three-dimensional atmosphere–ocean coupled model were conducted in current (CNTL) and pseudo-global warming (PGW) climates. The water vapor mixing ratio in the lower troposphere increased by 23%

The Gobi Desert is a dominant source of dust on the Asian continent. In this study, we analysed the characteristics of a typical Mongolian dust storm and identified a prominent dust hotspot in the Gobi Desert. During a field survey from Ulaanbaatar (the capital of Mongolia) to Dalanzadgad in the Gobi Desert, we encountered a typical dust storm on 28 April 2019, exhibiting a distinct dust wall. The

A prolonged heavy rainfall event occurred in Kyushu in early July 2020. Its large-scale environmental factors are investigated with observational and reanalysis data. Seven-day precipitation and moisture flux convergence around Kyushu were the greatest among the last 30 years. This pronounced convergence was maintained by nearly steady moisture influx, and the persistent upper-level trough to the northwest

This article is a correction to SOLA Vol.16A (2020) pp. 6-11.

Rossby waves propagating along the Asian jet frequently cause the breaking near the jet exit region. This study examines characteristics of oceanographic condition and atmospheric circulation associated with interdecadal variability of Rossby wave breaking frequency near Japan in August. Sea surface temperature during a period of the higher Rossby wave breaking frequency is cooler over the central

In this study, we conducted a domain-integrated vorticity budget analysis to quantitatively understand the developing mechanism of the Arctic Cyclone (AC) in August 2016 (AC16). The results showed that the vorticity enhancement of the AC16 was dominated by the horizontal flux convergence of vorticity at all layers with a maximum near the tropopause. The enhancement near the tropopause was characterized

In July 2018, record-breaking heavy precipitation caused catastrophic disasters in west Japan. This study investigated the predictability of this precipitation event using a regional ensemble data assimilation system. A series of daily ensemble forecast experiments showed that the forecast ensemble spread during the heavy precipitation event increased in the forecasts initialized on July 1 and July

Aerosol number concentrations and trace gases (SO2, O3, HCHO, and H2O2) were measured over Imizu City, Toyama Prefecture, Japan on August 5, 2020, from a helicopter. The concentrations of fine particles (0.3-0.5 μm) were high at ground level and at an altitude of approximately 1200 m due to the volcanic plume from Nishinoshima. However, concentrations of aerosol particles were low at an altitude of

La Niña cases that occurred after 1948 are classified into cold and non-cold winters in the Far East to investigate the formation of disparate teleconnection patterns corresponding to the two types and to compare with those during El Niño. According to composite analyses using reanalysis datasets, the North Pacific Oscillation (NPO)/western Pacific (WP) pattern (NPO/WP pattern) and the Pacific-North

This study investigates the impact of applying different types of initial and boundary perturbations for convective-scale ensemble data assimilation systems. Several OSSEs were performed with a 2-km horizontal resolution, considering a realistic environment, taking model error into account, and combining different perturbations' types with warm/cold start initialization. Initial perturbations produce

This study evaluated the effects of sea surface temperature (SST) resolution on dynamically downscaled daily surface air temperature (Tsrf) in the Kanto region during early summer. Two downscaling experiments and one additional experiment were conducted using different SST datasets for the months of June and July over a 10-year period. The results demonstrated that the Tsrf difference in the Kanto

The predictability of Typhoon Hagibis in October 2019 is examined with ensemble forecasts from four major operational numerical weather prediction centers. From six to four days before the landfall, the forecast from the Japan Meteorological Agency was the best among the four centers. However, the error increased sharply three days before the landfall. Consistent with the westward track error, a northwestward

In the 2019 tropical cyclone season in the western North Pacific, Typhoons FAXAI and HAGIBIS made landfall in Japan while keeping the intensity, resulting in serious disasters. This study addresses the influences of an increasing trend and variations in the upper ocean heat content above 26°C (tropical cyclone heat potential: TCHP) from January 1982 to June 2020 on FAXAI and HAGIBIS. TCHP underneath

Typhoon Hagibis (2019) caused widespread flooding and damage over eastern Japan. The associated rainfall maxima were primarily observed on the windward mountain slopes along with the west of the leading edge of a low-level front. Concomitantly, a significant positive value in sea surface temperature anomalies (SSTAs) was observed in association with an ocean eddy over the Oyashio region, together with

Numerical experiments on Typhoon Trami (2018) using a regional 1-km-mesh three-dimensional atmosphere–ocean coupled model in current and pseudo-global warming (PGW) climates were conducted to investigate future changes of a slow-moving intense typhoon under the warming climate. Over the warmer sea in the PGW climate, the maximum near-surface wind speed rapidly increased around the large eye of the

Impacts of historical warming on extremely heavy rainfall induced by Typhoon Hagibis (2019) are investigated using a storyline event attribution approach with the Japan Meteorological Agency Nonhydrostatic Model (JMA-NHM). Control experiments based on JMA mesoscale analysis data well reproduce the typhoon's track, intensity, and heavy precipitation. First, two non-warming experiments are conducted:

The internal structure and evolution of a monsoon trough (MT) and associated mesoscale convective systems (MCSs) in the western North Pacific were investigated, based mainly on radiosonde and a Doppler radar observations in Palau. The MT was observed on June 15-16, 2013, with the pre-existing disturbance of Typhoon Leepi (2013) being embedded in it. The large-scale circulation around the MT featured

The performances of bulk microphysical schemes were evaluated through comparisons with observations, including a new volume scanning video disdrometer targeting one of a typical snowfall event in Hokkaido, Japan. For the evaluation, downscaling experiments using three bulk microphysical schemes were conducted: a two-moment bulk scheme, a one-moment bulk scheme, and an improved version of the one-moment

To clarify three-dimensional (3-D) spatiotemporal variations and horizontal–vertical transport processes in nitrogen dioxide (NO2) over urban areas, combined NO2 profile observations by multiple Multi AXis Differential Optical Absorption Spectroscopy (MAX-DOAS) and direct wind observations by 3-D coherent Doppler lidar were made over an urban area in Japan. MAX-DOAS measurements were conducted at Yakuin

High-resolution boundary layer radar (BLR) and wavelet are utilized to observe microscale downdraft-updraft combinations. High-resolution BLR can observe thermal activity that pushed the stable layer. During this thermal, a combination of downdraft-updraft was also observed. A detailed observation of this combination was conducted in this study. Using a 1-dimensional continuous wavelet transform with

Climate change impact assessment studies often use future projections of only a few global climate models (GCMs) due to limited research resources. Here we develop a novel method to select a small subset of GCMs that widely capture the uncertainty range of large ensemble. By applying this method, we select a subset of five GCM projections from the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6)

The predictability of the July 2020 heavy rainfall event that saw record-breaking rainfall over Western Japan in July 2020 is examined with the near real-time SCALE-LETKF numerical modelling system in a low resolution 18-km configuration setting. Ensemble-mean 5-day rainfall total forecasts showed close agreement with Japanese Meteorological Agency 1-km precipitation analyses in relation to the large-scale

Typhoons are one of the most destructive weather systems with potentially serious impacts on human life, economics, social systems, and the environment. In particular, typhoons Jebi (2018), Faxai (2019), and Hagibis (2019), which made landfall in Japan, caused serious natural disasters in various areas of Japan and resulted in the record-breaking amount of insurance claims paid due to strong winds

One of the remarkable environmental characteristics of tropical cyclone (TC) Hagibis (2019) was the positive sea surface temperature (SST) anomaly observed in the western North Pacific Ocean. In this study, an ensemble-based sensitivity experiment was conducted with a nonhydrostatic model, focusing on the impact of SST on TC motion. The TC with the analyzed SST (warm run) moved faster near mainland

We report experimental observations of precipitable water vapor (PWV) derived using Global Positioning System/Global Navigation Satellite System (GPS/GNSS) receivers mounted on autonomous surface vehicles (ASVs), which were deployed in the tropical Pacific Ocean from July to September 2018. The GPS atmospheric delay was estimated by precise point positioning and converted to PWV with ASV surface meteorological

This study investigated characteristics of atmospheric environmental fields in the occurrence of quasi-stationary convective bands (QSCBs) in Kyushu, western Japan during the July 2020 heavy rainfall event. We performed case studies of extreme rainfall subevents in the Kumamoto and Kagoshima prefectures on 3-4 July (2020KK) and northern Kyushu on 6-7 July 2020 (2020NK), compared with two heavy rainfall

Relationship between diurnal convection and the intraseasonal oscillation (ISO) over the western Maritime Continent (MC) was investigated by a case study of an ISO event that occurred during the Years of the Maritime Continent (YMC)-Sumatra 2017 campaign. Two sets of global cloud-permitting simulations using cloud microphysics settings for ISO prediction (CTL) and for climate simulation (MOD) were

We investigate regional characteristics of future changes in snowfall in Japan under two emission scenarios—RCP2.6 and RCP8.5—using a high-resolution regional climate model with 5 km grid spacing and discuss the influence of changes in atmospheric circulation. The high-resolution model can simulate details of changes in distributions of total snowfall in Japan. Under RCP2.6, the annual total snowfall

Synoptic circulation patterns associated with heavy snowfall events in Sapporo are examined using large ensemble simulation with 60-km global climate experiments. For snowfall, a 5-km dynamically downscaled model from the 20-km regional simulation is utilized. To identify synoptic circulation patterns, self-organizing maps (SOMs) are applied, and their response to a warming climate is examined. The

Aerosol effects on deep convective cloud (DCC) have been recognized as one of the complex subjects in climatic studies because of the difficulty in quantifying the sole effect of aerosols on DCC. The complexity further arises if the atmosphere has very strong temporal and spatial variations such as that of Indo-Pacific Warm Pool (IPWP) region. Considering the strong influence of IPWP region on global

We quantified the global bromine- and iodine-mediated tropospheric ozone loss using global chemical transport model simulations. We tested three datasets of very short-lived substances (VSLS) emissions, three datasets of sea surface iodide concentrations, and an explicit representation of the effects of multi-phase reactions at the air-sea boundary on dry deposition. We then determined optimal model

This study investigated the impact of sea surface temperature (SST) on a snowfall event of late January 2018 on Kanto, Honshu, Japan, associated with an extratropical cyclone (south-coast cyclone) along the Pacific side, during the Kuroshio large meandering period by a regional atmospheric model. We addressed SST impacts on the snowfall event under almost the same synoptic-scale conditions, such as

Since March 2012, multi-year ground-based observation of atmospheric aerosol particles has been carried out in Tsukuba, Japan to characterize the aerosol particle number concentrations (NCs), air mass origin relevance, and specifically, their cloud condensation nuclei (CCN) and ice nucleating particle (INP) characteristics. The CCN NCs at any water supersaturation (SS) exhibit strong seasonality, being

Heavy rainfalls often occur when a tropical cyclone (TC) exists on the sea off the south coast. These pre-typhoon rainfalls (PRE) is associated with the northward moisture transport ahead of the TC. In this paper, we examine the northward moisture transport by the ageostrophic winds associated with typhoon T0918 (Melor) and its impact on PRE. According to a numerical simulation conducted in the previous

The thermal stress along a marathon course in Tokyo is evaluated using a radiation balance model. The wet-bulb globe temperatures (WBGTs) for runners and spectators are calculated based on the surrounding building and tree geometries using the Solar LongWave Environmental Irradiance Geometry model. Analysis is conducted in terms of summer days in August 2018, which was during the hottest summer in

Aircraft observations were conducted over the eastern mountainous areas of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) in September 2017 to characterize the microphysical properties of diurnal convective clouds. Aerosol particle and cloud condensation nuclei (CCN) measurements indicate that the air mass had a continental nature, resulting in high cloud droplet concentrations of 600-800 cm−3. Two case studies were

Japan underwent a nationwide self-restraint of human activities in spring 2020 to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 infection. In order to evaluate the effect of suppressed human activities on temperature in the Tokyo Metropolitan area, a statistical analysis was made for temperature anomalies during the self-restraint period using hourly data on the AMeDAS network. The temperature anomaly was defined

We show that a modification to the latent heat flux (LHF) formulation in Non-hydrostatic Icosahedral Atmospheric Model (NICAM) impacts the representation of a Madden–Julian oscillation (MJO) event during the Pre-Years of the Maritime Continent (Pre-YMC) field campaign in 2015. First, we compare the LHFs computed by the standard NICAM setting with those estimated from the ship observation during Pre-YMC

A shipboard lidar system was examined the capability to retrieve detailed variation of the water vapor mixing ratio in and above the marine atmospheric boundary layer (MABL). The water vapor mixing ratio is retrieved from the ratio of Raman lidar signals by water vapor and by nitrogen, with the help of radiosonde data beside. Data obtained during two special observations, Pre-YMC and YMC-Sumatra, off

This study investigated rainfall trends and their associations with tropical cyclones (TCs) during the period of 1979-2019, using TC best-track data from the Regional Specialized Meteorological Center Tokyo - Typhoon Center and daily rainfall data from 138 meteorological stations in Vietnam. The radius of influence of TCs on local rainfall was limited to 500 km from TC centers. The average annual number

To discuss the feasibility of the Himawari follow-on program, impacts of a hyperspectral sounder on a geostationary satellite (GeoHSS) is assessed using an observing system simulation experiment. Hypothetical GeoHSS observations are simulated by using an accurate reanalysis dataset for a heavy rainfall event in western Japan in 2018. The global data assimilation experiment demonstrates that the assimilation

Although wetlands are the largest natural source of atmospheric methane, the amount and variability of methane emissions from wetlands still have large uncertainty. We investigated the local growth rate of the column-averaged methane dry air mole fraction (XCH4) in Siberia where wetlands are widely abundant using 11-year (2009-2019) Greenhouse gases Observing SATellite (GOSAT) data. While the mean

The Years of the Maritime Continent or YMC is a multi-national and multi-year effort, which aims at improving our understanding and prediction skill of the weather-climate systems over the Maritime Continent (MC) as well as its global impact. Its field campaign phase has been started since July 2017 and is scheduled to continue beyond 2020. During the campaign period, many intensive observations have

Given vigorous mean diurnal variation (MDV) of cumulus convection and surface wind over coastal waters of the Indonesian Maritime Continent, surface sensible and latent heat fluxes (SHF and LHF) are expected to also exhibit significant MDV. However, it is difficult to grasp characteristics of MDV of these fluxes due to lack of surface observation data. Recently, two intensive observation campaigns