Japan Geoscience Union Meeting 2019

Presentation information

[J] Oral

A (Atmospheric and Hydrospheric Sciences ) » A-CG Complex & General

[A-CG37] Science in the Arctic Region

Thu. May 30, 2019 10:45 AM - 12:15 PM 303 (3F)

convener:NAOYA KANNA(Arctic Research Center, Hokkaido University), Masashi Niwano(Meteorological Research Institute), Tetsu Nakamura(Faculty of Environmental Earth Science, Hokkaido University), Shunsuke Tei(Arctic Research Center, Hokkaido University), Chairperson:Shunsuke Tei(Arctic Research Center, Hokkaido University), Masashi Niwano(Meteorological Research Institute)

11:45 AM - 12:00 PM

[ACG37-11] Occurrence frequency of lee-side downslope winds near Siorapaluk in northwest Greenland

*Akihiro Hashimoto1, Tetsuhide Yamasaki2, Teruo Aoki3,1, Masashi Niwano1, Satoru Yamaguchi4 (1.Meteorological Research Institute, 2.Avangnaq, 3.The Graduate School of Natural Science and Technology, Okayama University, 4.Snow and Ice Research Center, National Research Institute for Earth Science and Disaster Resilience)

Keywords:Greenland, lee-side downslope wind, Non-hydrostatic model

In early April 2018, Niwano et al. (2018) conducted the scientific traverse expedition “Snow impurity and glacial microbe effect on the abrupt warming in the Arctic (SIGMA) Traverse 2018”. The expedition crews had initially planned to depart Siorapaluk on April 2, 2018. However, their departure was delayed by four days because of strong winds and snow blocking the way. Numerical experiment showed that the strong wind had characteristics of a lee-side downslope wind (Hashimoto et al., 2018). Matoba and Yamasaki (2018) reported a sea ice outflow event and its damage to fishery along the coast of Qaanaaq (50-km southeast of Siorapaluk) in early December 2016, which was the first time experience for residents of Qaanaaq over the last 30 years. They assumed that northeasterly winds of more than 30 ms-1on 6-hour average dispersed sea ice from the coast, based on observation data at Qaanaaq airport.

These strong wind events seriously affected the scientific activity and residents’ living, which motivate the authors to study occurrence characteristics of strong winds in the northwest Greenland. According to observation performed during 2016-2017 and 2017-2018 winter seasons in Siorapaluk, strong winds more than 15 ms-1occur in several times. These winds are always from the north-northeast to the observation point, which means that these winds blow beyond the ridgeline in the north of Siorapaluk. Year-round observation in Qaanaaq shows that strong winds appear also in summer as well as in winter. Some strong wind events are found to occur simultaneously in Siorapaluk and Qaanaaq. Numerical simulations are conducted for the period from May 2017 to April 2018 by using the Japan Meteorological Agency’s non-hydrostatic model (JMA-NHM) with the 1-km horizontal resolution to reveal temporal and spatial distributions of strong winds and mechanisms causing them. Statistical features of strong winds and dynamical connections between synoptic and local wind systems will be presented in the meeting.

References
Matoba, S. and T. Yamasaki, 2018: Sea ice outflow damage to fishery in Qaanaaq, northwestern Greenland in December 2016. – Changes of the livelihood associated with social and environmental changes – . Snow and Ice in Hokkaido, 37, 51-54.(in Japanese)
Niwano, M., T. Yamasaki and S. Yamaguchi, 2018: Arctic dog-sled expedition 2018, Seppyo, 80, 588-592. (in Japanese)
Hashimoto, A., M. Niwano, S. Yamaguchi, T. Yamasaki and T. Aoki, 2018: Numerical simulation of lee-side downslope winds near Siorapaluk in northwest Greenland. CAS/JSC WGNE Research Activities in Atmospheric and Oceanic Modelling, 48, 5.05-5.06.

Acknowledgements
This work was partly supported by the Joint Research Program of the Institute of Low Temperature Science, Hokkaido University, Japan, and JSPS KAKENHI Grant Numbers, JP15H01733, JP16H01772, and JP17K12817.