Areas of Updraft Air Motion in an Idealised Weather Research and Forecasting Model Simulation of Atmospheric Boundary Layer Response to Different Floe Size Distributions

Marta Wenta

doi:https://doi.org/10.34808/x55q-sz53_dyr_roz25

Areas of Updraft Air Motion in an Idealised Weather Research and Forecasting Model Simulation of Atmospheric Boundary Layer Response to Different Floe Size Distributions

Abstract

Presented dataset is part of a numerical modelling study focusing on the analysis of the influence of sea ice floe size distribution (FSD) on the horizontal and vertical structure of convection in the atmosphere. The total area and spatial arrangement of the up-drafts indicates that the FSD affects the total moisture content and the values of area averaged turbulent fluxes in the model domain. In fact, while convective updrafts occur in every model simulation, their intensity differs with varying FSD due to the changing extent and strength of breeze-like circulation. When the floes are tightly packed in the model domain (simulations with 1000 and 5000 floes) the updrafts are numerous but weaker due to weaker breeze-like circulation. In the simulations with smaller floe numbers (Nf =50 and Nf=100), the opposite situation takes place and the updrafts, while covering a smaller area, are stronger and thus are the values of total moisture and area averaged heat content for the model domain, as described in Wenta and Herman (2019).