Analysis of Northern New England Cold-Air Damming Events

冷空气筑坝是一种现象，某些风向可能导致较冷的空气被困在山上。 在美国东部，这些事件往往伴随着降水，在冬季降雪和冻雨常见的情况下尤其危险。 这些事件的强度很难预测，对新英格兰北方山区的冷空气阻塞事件的科学关注较少。 该奖项将使研究团队能够开发气候学，并对冷空气筑坝事件进行数值模拟，以回答有关其形成，演变和消散的问题。 研究结果应有助于改善与冷空气筑坝有关的高影响冬季降水事件的预报。 一些研究生和本科生将参与这项研究，帮助培养下一代科学家。研究小组将对北方新英格兰冷空气筑坝（CAD）事件进行为期15年的气候学和综合研究，目标是确定事件何时发生，何时最激烈，事件在选定地点的比较情况，以及CAD在降水类型上的作用。 使用WRF模式模拟CAD事件的集合将有助于回答与CAD的数值天气预报预报对初始条件不确定性和参数化方案变化的敏感性有关的问题。 模拟还将有助于回答有关CAD的形成，强度，范围，演变和侵蚀的可预测性问题。

Cold air damming is a phenomenon where certain wind directions can cause cooler air to be trapped against a mountain. In the eastern US, these events are often accompanied by precipitation, and can be especially hazardous in winter with snowfall and freezing rain common. The intensity of these events is difficult to forecast and less scientific attention has been paid to cold air damming events in the mountainous areas of northern New England. This award will allow the research team to develop a climatology and conduct numerical modeling of cold air damming events in order to answer questions about their formation, evolution, and dissipation. The results of the study should help to improve forecasts of high-impact winter precipitation events related to cold air damming. A number of graduate and undergraduate students will be involved in the research, helping to develop the next generation of scientists.The research team will develop a 15-year climatology and composite study of northern New England cold air damming (CAD) events with a goal of determining when the events occur and when they are most intense, how the events compare at selected locations, and what the role of CAD is on precipitation types. Ensembles of simulations of CAD events using the WRF model will help to answer questions related to the sensitivity of numerical weather prediction forecasts of CAD to initial condition uncertainty and variations in parameterization schemes. The simulations will also help to answer questions about predictability of the formation, strength, extent, evolution, and erosion of CAD.