A Numerical Investigation of the Effect of Wave‐Induced Mixing on Tropical Cyclones Using a Coupled Ocean‐Atmosphere‐Wave Model

Abstract

AbstractOcean surface waves play a significant role in regulating the sea surface temperature and mixed layer depth, which are essential for accurate prediction of tropical cyclone (TC) intensity. The effects of wave breaking and wave orbital motion induced mixing on the TC intensity and size are investigated using a coupled ocean‐atmosphere‐wave model for both idealized and real TC cases. The results show that both wave breaking and wave orbital motion lead to greater sea surface temperature cooling and mixed layer deepening, resulting in decreases in TC intensity and size owing to the reduction of air‐sea heat fluxes. Wave orbital motion has a slightly greater effect than wave breaking on the TC intensity and size when the mixed layer is shallow, whereas it has a much greater effect when the mixed layer is deep. In addition, including wave orbital motion induced mixing in models can effectively reduce the error in simulated TC size.