Propagation of Rossby Waves over Ridges Excited by Interannual Wind Forcing in a Western North Pacific Model

Abstract

Numerical experiments with a multi-level general circulation model have been performed to investigate basic processes of westward propagation of Rossby waves excited by interannual wind stress forcing in an idealized western North Pacific model with ocean ridges. When the wind forcing with an oscillation period of 3 years is imposed around 180°E and 30°N, far from Japan, barotropic waves excited by the wind can hardly cross the ridges, such as the Izu-Ogasawara Ridge. On the other hand, a large part of the first-mode baroclinic waves are transmitted across the ridges, having net mass transport. The propagation speed of the first-mode baroclinic wave is accelerated (decelerated) when an anticyclonic (cyclonic) circulation is formed at the sea surface, due to a deeper (shallower) upper layer, and to southward (slightly northward) drift of the circulation. Thus, when the anticyclonic circulation is formed on the northern side of the cyclonic one, they propagate almost together. The second-mode baroclinic waves converted from the first-mode ones on the ridges arrive south of Japan, although their effects are small. The resulting volume transport variation of the western boundary current (the Kuroshio) reaches about 60% of the Sverdrup transport variability estimated from the wind stress. These characteristics are common for the interannual forcing case with a longer oscillation period. In the intraseasonal and seasonal forcing cases, on the other hand, the transport variation is much smaller than those in the interannual forcing cases.