The role of land surface processes on tropical cyclones: Introduction to land surface models

Abstract

The role of land surface processes in land falling tropical cyclones is an area of emerging interest. Tropical cyclones are formed as organized convection over warm water (typically 26.5 °C, Gray, 1968) packing tremendous amounts of energy. Tropical cyclones have a typical size of 200-2000 km with a life span of about one to two weeks. The cyclone and its environment are interlinked. There are a number of environmental factors that are important for sustaining and intensifying a tropical cyclone including low humidity, cooler sea surface temperature (SST), or higher tropopause temperatures, dry air intrusion from land masses, and large vertical wind shear (Gray, 1968; McBride and Zehr, 1981). However a number of environmental conditions can change the evolution of a landfalling storm.