A reexamination of the genesis of African waves

Abstract

The problem of genesis of easterly African waves is rexamined as a linear eigenvalue instability problem of a supposedly realistic basic zonal shear flow with and without a cumulus heating. Evidence will be presented to show how the growth rate, the propagation speed, and the overall composite structure of the observed tropical easterly waves can be well reproduced in the model in conjunction with a CISK representation of the latent heating. The degree of resemblance between the structure of the model unstable wave and the observed African waves is found to be significantly dependent upon the secondary features of the basic shear flow. -from Author