Impact of sea surface temperature on westerlies over the western pacific warm pool: Case study of an event in 2001/02

Abstract

A regional atmospheric model was employed to demonstrate that a strong westerly wind, which occurred around December 2001 prior to the 2002/03 El Niño event, was enhanced by sea surface temperature gradient along the equator in the western Pacific warm pool region. Furthermore, a regional oceanic model was employed to demonstrate that the enhanced westerly wind event substantially increased oceanic Kelvin wave response along the equatorial Pacific Ocean. © 2014, the Meteorological Society of Japan.