Identification

Title

Quantifying heavy precipitation throughout the entire tropical cyclone life cycle

Abstract

Tropical cyclones (TCs) and their associated precipitation can have devastating impacts on the areas affected, with outcomes ranging from mudslides to inland flash flooding. Previous studies have used a fixed radius around the TC to isolate storm-related precipitation. One previous study instead used a dynamic radius of 8 m s−1 winds, but the wind field of the TC can deteriorate or shift quickly after landfall or the onset of extratropical transition (ET). This study uses a dynamical radius derived from the 500-hPa geopotential height in and around the TC to define TC- and post-tropical cyclone (PTC)-related heavy precipitation, allowing for the analysis of precipitation with tropical origins after the official demise of the original TC. Climatologies are constructed, indicating a maximum in TC- and PTC-related heavy precipitation in the west North Pacific and a secondary maximum in the east North Pacific. PTC-related heavy precipitation accounts for as much as 40% of the annual heavy precipitation in the northwest portion of the west North Pacific basin and 3.13% of heavy precipitation globally. We observe that the major hurricane stage contributes on average 2.6% of the global TC- and PTC-related precipitation, while the less intense but more common tropical storm stages of the TC life cycle contribute 85.7% of this observed precipitation. This analysis framework can be further extended to assess model biases and climate projections of TC and PTC precipitation.

Resource type

document

Resource locator

Unique resource identifier

code

https://n2t.org/ark:/85065/d7f193jb

codeSpace

Dataset language

eng

Spatial reference system

code identifying the spatial reference system

Classification of spatial data and services

Topic category

geoscientificInformation

Keywords

Keyword set

keyword value

Text

originating controlled vocabulary

title

Resource Type

reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2016-01-01T00:00:00Z

Geographic location

West bounding longitude

East bounding longitude

North bounding latitude

South bounding latitude

Temporal reference

Temporal extent

Begin position

End position

Dataset reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2022-10-01T00:00:00Z

Frequency of update

Quality and validity

Lineage

Conformity

Data format

name of format

version of format

Constraints related to access and use

Constraint set

Use constraints

Copyright 2022 American Meteorological Society (AMS).

Limitations on public access

None

Responsible organisations

Responsible party

contact position

OpenSky Support

organisation name

UCAR/NCAR - Library

full postal address

PO Box 3000

Boulder

80307-3000

email address

opensky@ucar.edu

web address

http://opensky.ucar.edu/

name: homepage

responsible party role

pointOfContact

Metadata on metadata

Metadata point of contact

contact position

OpenSky Support

organisation name

UCAR/NCAR - Library

full postal address

PO Box 3000

Boulder

80307-3000

email address

opensky@ucar.edu

web address

http://opensky.ucar.edu/

name: homepage

responsible party role

pointOfContact

Metadata date

2025-07-11T15:59:04.634612

Metadata language

eng; USA