Thermally Forced Convection over a Mountainous Tropical Island

Abstract

Abstract Observations from the Dominica Experiment (DOMEX) and cloud-resolving numerical simulations are used to study a thermally forced convection event over the Caribbean island of Dominica on 18 April 2011. A clear diurnal cycle of island thermal forcing and cumulus convection was observed, with cumuli initiating over the southwestern flank of the ridge and deepening as they drifted eastward. Apart from errors in cloud fraction and (notably) precipitation, the simulations verified well against the observations, provided horizontal grid spacings of 500 m or less were used. The simulated flows developed an island-scale solenoidal circulation with an organized and intense updraft over the ridge that focused convective initiation. Sensitivity tests investigated the impacts of topographic forcing, subcloud winds, and cloud–radiative feedbacks on the island-scale horizontal inflow and cloud vertical mass flux. These experiments confirmed that thermal forcing drove the island convection and that the inflow and cloud mass flux were maximized under weak ambient cross-island winds. The simulations also indicated that cloud shading and precipitation each reduced the island inflow by ~20% while cloud latent heat release enhanced it by ~20%. However, precipitation caused a much smaller reduction in cloud mass flux (10%) than did cloud shading (50%) owing to effective secondary convective initiation by subcloud cold pools. Thermodynamic heat-engine theory provided accurate predictions of the simulated solenoidal updraft magnitudes in selected cases. It also provided a simple explanation for the weakening of the simulated thermal circulation in the presence of island orography: a shallower mixed layer reduced the efficiency of the thermal circulation.