Influence of vertical wind shear on wind- and rainfall areas of tropical cyclones making landfall over South Korea

Abstract

The wind- and rainfall areas of tropical cyclones (TCs) making landfall over South Korea were examined for the period 1998–2013 by using the Modern Era Retrospective Analysis for Research and Applications, version 2 (MERRA-2) and Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) 3B42 data. Here, the wind- and rainfall areas were defined as the regions where wind speeds and precipitation rates exceed 14 m s-1 and 80 mm day-1 within 1000 km from the TC center, respectively. In general, TCs show significantly asymmetric wind and rainfall structures, with strong vertical wind shear appearing over South Korea during the landfall period. The rainfall area significantly increases with environmental vertical wind shear while the wind area is not sensitive to it. Composite analyses of the cases of strong and weak vertical wind shear confirm that the increase of rainfall area is related to the asymmetric convection (rising/sinking motion in the downshear-left/upshear-right side) induced by the vertical wind shear. This work highlights the importance of local atmospheric environment in determining the area primarily affected by strong winds or heavy rainfall during TC landfalls.