Contributions of foehn and urban heat island to the extreme high-temperature event in Niigata City during the night of 23-24 August 2018

Abstract

We quantitatively evaluated the contributions of foehn winds and the urban heat island (UHI) effect to an extreme high-temperature nocturnal event at Niigata city on 23-24 August 2018. During this event, southeasterly winds blew continually across the Niigata Plain and temperatures on the plain were higher than those in the windward region of the mountain range. Back-trajectory analysis and numerical simulations with and without topography showed that the southeasterly winds were foehn winds that caused precipitation and latent heating on the windward slope of the mountain range. The foehn winds and UHI contributed about 2.8°C and 1.9°C, respectively, to the extreme high-temperature of 31.0°C at 2100 JST in Niigata city. The combined impact of the foehn winds and the UHI at Niigata was about 4.0°C during the night. The contribution of the foehn winds was greater at around midnight, whereas that of the UHI was greater during the early night.