![]() ![]() ![]() "That's when you need to know, do they self-propel, or are they driven by some very much larger-scale wind patterns that may change with climate change. "The winds that carry these things to ashore are so tantalizingly, delicately near zero, that everything could affect them," Mapes said. He plans to study these events more closely using satellite data and will look at into the possibility that these atmospheric lakes occur elsewhere in the world. These are questions that would need to be answered before Mapes and other researchers can begin to study how climate change could affect atmospheric lake systems. This might be due to some feature of the larger wind pattern, or perhaps that the atmospheric lakes are self-propelled by winds generated during rain production. He is working to understand why atmospheric lakes pinch off from the river-like pattern from which they form, and how and why they move westward. Weather patterns in this region of the world have received little attention from meteorologists, limited mostly to studies of rain and water vapor on a monthly rather than day-to-day scale according to Mapes. "I look forward to learning more local knowledge about them, in this area with a venerable and fascinating nautical history where observant sailors coined the word monsoon for wind patterns, and surely noticed these occasional rainstorms, too." "It's a place that's dry on average, so when these happen, they're surely very consequential," Mapes said. This amount of water can create significant precipitation for the dry lowlands of eastern African countries where millions of people live, according to Mapes. If all the water vapor from these lakes were liquified, it would form a puddle only a few centimeters (a couple inches) deep and around 1,000 kilometers (about 620 miles) wide. The atmospheric lakes last for days at a time and occur several times a year. Lakes farther off the equator also occur, and sometimes those become tropical cyclones. In an initial survey to catalog such storms, Mapes used five years of satellite data to spot 17 atmospheric lakes lasting longer than six days and within 10 degrees of the equator, in all seasons. Accurate hydrometeorological records and observations with different timelines are crucial to assess climate evolution and weather forecast. They then float along ocean and coastal regions at the equatorial line in areas where the average wind speed is around zero. Hydrometeorology aims at measuring and understanding the physics, chemistry, energy and water fluxes of the atmosphere, and their coupling with the earth surface environmental parameters. Unlike the fast-flowing atmospheric rivers, the smaller atmospheric lakes detach from their source as they move at a sedate pace toward the coast.Ītmospheric lakes begin as water vapor streams that flow from the western side of the South Asian monsoon and pinch off to become their own measurable, isolated objects. These phenomena are defined by the presence of water vapor concentrated enough to produce rain, rather than being formed and defined by a vortex, like most storms on Earth. Like the better-known streams of humid, rainy air called atmospheric rivers that are famous for delivering large amounts of precipitation, atmospheric lakes start as filaments of water vapor in the Indo-Pacific. However, with climate disruption causing warmer oceans overall, some scientists encourage preparation for a potentially strong hurricane season this summer anyways.Brian Mapes, an atmospheric scientist at the University of Miami who recently noticed and described the unique storms, will present his findings on Thursday, 16 December at AGU's Fall Meeting 2021. One perk may be that during times of El Niño, the Atlantic coast tends to grapple with fewer hurricanes. Flash floods and overloaded infrastructure issues have plagued some southern states in recent months. is prone to more storms during El Niño, posing a threat to exacerbate the heavy rain the region has been experiencing. What El Niño means for extreme weatherįor Canada and the northern U.S., El Niño usually brings warm, dry weather-a worry for Canada’s already abnormally hot spell this year and the ravaging wildfire crisis. The last period of El Niño spanned several months from late 2018 to mid-2019. “There are some computer models that are indicating that it might even go into later next year,” DaFilva says. Experts predict that this year, El Niño is likely to continue through the summer, fall, and winter. Read more: How El Niño May Test the Limits of Our Climate Knowledge How long is it expected to last?Įl Niño usually occurs every two to seven years, more frequently than its opposing climate phenomenon, La Niña, but neither follows a schedule.Įl Niño typically lasts nine to 12 months, but can sometimes carry on for years. ![]()
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