• Journal of Korean Society for Atmospheric Environment
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• v.15 no.4
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• pp.441-455
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• 1999

Meteorological characteristics of three high-ozone episodes in the Greater Seoul Area, selected on the basis of morning-average wind direction and speed for the 1990~1997 period, were investigated. Three high-ozone episodes thus selected were seven days of July 3~9, 1992, nine days of July 21~29, 1994, and three days of August 22~24, 1994. Along with surface meteorological data from the Seoul Weather Station, surface and 850-hPa wind fields over the Northest Asia around the Korean Peninsula were used for the analysis. In the July 1992 episode, westerly winds were most frequent as a result of the influence of a high-pressure system in the west behind the trough. In contrast, in the July 1994 episode, easterly winds were most frequent due to the effect of a typhoon moving north from the south of Japan. Despite different prevailing wind directions in the two episodes, the peak ozone concentration of each episode always occurred when a sea-land breeze developed in association with weak synoptic forcing. The August 1994 episode, selected as being representative of calm conditions, was another typical example in which peak ozone concentration rose to 322 ppb under the well-developed sea-land breeze. All three high-ozone episodes were terminated by precipitation, and subsequent rises in ozone concentrations were also suppressed by a series of precipitation afterwards. In particular, two heavy rainfalls were the main reason why the August 1994 episode, with the highest and second-highest ozone concentrations during the 1990~1997 period, lasted for only a few days.