Remote forcing of Indian Ocean warming on Northwest Pacific during El Niño decaying years: a FOAM model approach

Abstract

This paper attempts to analyze in detail the remote influence of the Indian Ocean Basin warming on the Northwest Pacific (NWP) during the year of decaying El Nino. Observation data and the Fast Ocean-Atmosphere coupled Model 1.5 were used to investigate the triggering conditions under which the remote influence is formed between the positive sea surface temperature (SST) anomaly in the North Indian Ocean and the Anomalous Northwest Pacific anticyclone (ANWPA). Our research show that it is only when there is a contributory background wind field over the Indian Ocean, i.e., when the Indian Summer Monsoon (ISM) reaches its peak, that the warmer SST anomaly in the North Indian Ocean incites significant easterly wind anomalies in the lower atmosphere of the Indo-West tropical Pacific. This then produces the remote influence on the ANWPA. Therefore, the SST anomaly in the North Indian Ocean might interfere with the prediction of the East Asia Summer Monsoon in the year of decaying El Nino. Both the sustaining effect of local negative SST anomalies in the NWP, and the remote effect of positive SST anomalies in the North Indian Ocean on the ANWPA, should be considered in further research.