Analysis of Surface Winds in Shelikof Strait, Alaska, UsingMoored Buoy Observations*

Abstract

Abstract The winds within Shelikof Strait, Alaska, have been examined using hourly observations from a pair of meteorological buoys moored at the ends of the strait for a 6-month period in 1994. The focus is on periods of gap winds, when the prominent terrain bordering Shelikof Strait constrains the low-level winds to accelerate down the local pressure gradient in a direction approximately parallel to the axis of the strait. Statistics have been amassed on the performance of a simple, Bernoulli-type gap wind model during periods of downstrait (northeasterly) gap flow. A series of model experiments have been conducted to elucidate the processes important to gap flow in Shelikof Strait. The model best predicts the observed alongstrait component of the wind at the exit of the strait (explaining 74% of the variance) when it includes not just surface friction, but also parameterizations of the Coriolis effect due to the cross-strait wind and of entrainment. The latter process is studied further using upper-air...