Modelling adverse meteorological conditions for aircraft arising from airflow over complex terrain

Abstract

With the aim of developing a forecasting system for the prediction of adverse meteorological conditions in the vicinity of complex terrain for aircraft landing at Hong Kong International Airport, the linearized, quasi‐empirical FLOWSTAR model has been configured to represent a series of eight landing events (2015–2017); half of these events reported significant wind shear and, for two, the landing attempt was aborted. Meteorological data used as input to the model have been derived from Hong Kong Observatory radiosonde measurements; these are the most reliable available despite being recorded at a location distant from the airport and at one or more hours before or after landing events. In general, the model predicts stronger wind shear for cases where adverse conditions have been reported. Analysis of the magnitude of wind shear generated as a result of wind veering and backing helps to quantify the importance of nonlinear flow features such as trapped lee waves. The model is able to represent strong downslope flows and recirculating flow regions (rotors) generated by the mountainous region located upwind of the airport. Comparisons of model predictions against LIDAR traces indicate that the model replicates wind shear for 50% of cases where it was recorded, although the location and magnitude of the wind shear usually differs between the modelled and measured datasets; the lack of agreement is likely to be because the input meteorological conditions are not wholly representative of the upstream conditions and the LIDAR trace does not exactly coincide with the aircraft trajectory.