Vertical wind profiles for typhoon, monsoon and thunderstorm winds

Abstract

The vertical profiles of mean wind speed within the atmospheric boundary layer have always been a focus of attention in wind engineering. In particular, the characteristics of wind speed profiles associated with different wind phenomena are of great significance in many engineering fields. Hence, this study presents a comparative analysis on the wind profile characteristics in connection with typhoon, monsoon and thunderstorm winds respectively, in which the wind profiles are constructed by synchronizing the wind measurements taken from a surface cup-anemometer and a Doppler radar profiler equipped at a coastal weather station in Hong Kong. For each type of wind phenomenon, the shape of the wind speed profiles is examined, and the fitting parameters contained in the logarithmic-law and the power-law model are derived. In addition, some other characteristic parameters associated with the wind speed profiles, such as wind shear coefficient and gust factor, etc, are determined as well to enhance the understanding of the characteristics of wind profiles in connection with different wind phenomena.