A Mesoscale Analysis over South Florida for a High Rainfall Event

Abstract

Abstract The meteorological data collected during the 1973 NOAA-EML Florida Area Cumulus Experiment was used to describe the mesoscale weather patterns on 4 August 1973. It was found that the high rainfall on this date was due to the superposition of a synoptic-scale disturbance and the normal shallow sea breeze convergence field. The synoptic disturbance was not resolved from the conventional synoptic analyses. On this date, the thunderstorm activity was highly correlated with the diurnal heating and apparently developed in favored regions related to both the sea breeze convergence zone along the west coast and to the larger scale disturbance. The surface wind and temperature patterns Were found to be strongly controlled by the diurnal heating cycle, and by the occurrence or non-occurrence of showers. It is concluded that the reduction in lower level wind speed after a rain occurrence was a result of surface cooling causing a decoupling of the surface from the larger scale pressure gradient. The analysis...