The climatology of small-scale orographic precipitation over the Olympic Mountains: patterns and processes
Minder JR, Durran DR, Roe GH, Anders AM. 2008. The climatology of small-scale orographic precipitation over the Olympic Mountains: patterns and processes. Quarterly Journal of the royal Meteorological Society. 2008:1-23
From the Abstract: "The climatology of small-scale patterns of mountain precipitation is poorly constrained, yet important for applications ranging from natural hazard assessment to understanding the geologic evolution of mountain ranges. Synthesizing four rainy seasons of high-resolution precipitation observations and mesoscale model output (from the Penn State/NCAR MM5), reveals a persistent small-scale pattern of precipitation over the ~10 km wide, ~800 m high ridges and valleys of the western Olympic Mountains, Washington State, USA. This pattern is characterized by a 50-70% excess accumulation over the ridge crests relative to the adjacent valleys in the annual mean. While the model shows excellent skill in stimulating these patterns at seasonal time-scales, major errors exist for individual storms. ... Investigation of a range of storm events has revealed the following mechanism for the climatological pattern. Regions of enhanced condensation of cloud water are produced by ascent in stable flow over the windward slopes of major ridges. Synoptically generated precipitation grows by collection within these clouds, leading to enhanced precipitation which is advected by the prevailing winds."
- Type
- Journal Article
- Authors
- Minder, Justin; Durran, Dale; Roe, Gerard; Anders, Alison
- Units
- OLYM
- Keywords
- Atmospheric Sciences, Climate, mountain precipitation