• Journal of Environmental Science International
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• v.21 no.12
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• pp.1511-1521
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• 2012

An attempt is made to analyse characteristic features of heavy rainfalls which occur at the metropolitan area of the Korean peninsular the on- and off- Changma season. For this, two representative heavy rainfall episodes are selected; one is the on-Changma season wherein a torrential rain episode happened at Goyang city on 12 July 2006, and the other is the off-Changma season, a heavy rainfall event in Seoul on 21 September 2006. Both recorded considerable amounts of precipitation, over 250mm in a half-day, which greatly exceeded the amount expected by numerical prediction models at those times, and caused great damage to property and life in the affected area. Similarities in the characteristics of both episodes were shown by; the location of upper-level jet streak and divergence fields of the upper wind over heavy rainfall areas, significantly high equivalent potential temperatures in the low atmospheric layer due to the entrainment of hot and humid air by the low-level jet, and the existence of very dry air and cold air pool in the middle layer of the atmosphere at the peak time of the rainfall events. Among them, differences in dynamic features of the low-level jet and the position of rainfall area along the low-level jet are remarkable.

• Proceedings of the Korea Water Resources Association Conference
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• 2008.05a
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• pp.299-303
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• 2008

In this study, an uncertainty assessment for surface air temperature(T2m) and precipitation(PCP) over East Asia is carried out. The data simulated by the intergovermental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) Atmosphere-Ocean coupled general circulation Model (AOGCM) are used to assess the uncertainty. Examination of the seasonal uncertainty of T2m and PCP variabilities shows that spring-summer cold bias and fall warm bias of T2m are found over both East Asia and the Korea peninsula. In contrast, distinctly summer dry bias and winter-spring wet bias of PCP over the Korea peninsula is found. To investigate the PCP seasonal variability over East Asia, the cyclostationary empirical orthogonal function(CSEOF) analysis is employed. The CSEOF analysis can extract physical modes (spatio-temporal patterns) and their undulation (PC time series) of PCP, showing the evolution of PCP. A comparison between spatio-temporal patterns of observed and modeled PCP anomalies shows that positive PCP anomalies located in northeastern China (north of Korea) of the multi-model ensemble(MME) cannot explain properly the contribution to summer monsoon rainfalls across Korea and Japan. The uncertainty of modeled PCP indicates that there is disagreement between observed and MME anomalies. The spatio-temporal deviation of the PCP is significantly associated with lower- and upper-level circulations. In particular, lower-level moisture transports from the warm pool of the western Pacific and corresponding moisture convergence significantly contribute to summer rainfalls. These lower- and upper-level circulations physically consistent with PCP give a insight of the reason why differences between modeled and observed PCP occur.