Summer climate of Madagascar and monsoon pulsing of its vortex

Abstract

This study analyzes the climate of Madagascar (12°–26°S, 43°–50°E) and its relation to the Indian Ocean during austral summer (Dec–Mar). Moisture converges onto a standing easterly wave and floods are prevalent in late summer. All-island daytime land temperatures exceed 38 °C in October and are ~4 °C above sea temperatures during summer. Analysis of thermally induced diurnal convection and circulation revealed inflow during the afternoon recirculated from the southeastern mountains and the warm Mozambique Channel. Summer rainfall follows latent and sensible heat flux during the first half of the day, and gains a surplus by evening via thunderstorms over the western plains. At the inter-annual time-scale, 2.3 years oscillations in all-island rainfall appear linked with the stratospheric quasi-biennial oscillation and corresponding 80 Dobson Unit ozone fluctuations during flood events. Wet spells at frequencies from 11–27 days derive from locally-formed tropical cyclones and NW-cloud bands. Flood case studies exhibit moisture recycling in the confluence zone between the sub-tropical anticyclone and the lee-side vortex. Hovmoller analysis of daily rainfall reinforces the concept of local generation and pulsing by cross-equatorial (Indian winter) monsoon flow rather than zonal atmospheric waves. Since the surface water budget is critical to agriculture in Madagascar, this study represents a further step to understand its meso-scale summer climate.