• Atmosphere
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• v.28 no.4
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• pp.369-382
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• 2018

Planetary boundary layer height (PBLH), produced by the Local Data Assimilation and Prediction System (LDAPS), was verified using RawinSonde (RS) data obtained from observation at Daegwallyeong (DGW) and Sokcho (SCW) during the International Collaborative Experiments for Pyeongchang 2018 Olympic and Paralympic winter games (ICE-POP 2018). The PBLH was calculated using RS data by applying the bulk Richardson number and the parcel method. This calculated PBLH was then compared to the values produced by LDAPS. The PBLH simulations for DGW and SCW were generally underestimation. However, the PBLH was an overestimation from surface to 200 m and 450 m at DGW and SCW, respectively; this result of model's failure to correctly simulate the Surface Boundary Layer (SBL) and the Mixing Layer (ML) as the PBLH. When the accuracy of the PBLH simulation is low, large errors are seen in the mid- and low-level humidity. The highest frequencies of Planetary boundary layer (PBL) types, calculated by the LDAPS at DGW and SCW, were presented as types Ι and II, respectively. Analysis of meteorological factors according to the PBL types indicate that the PBLH of the existing stratocumulus were overestimated when the mid- and low-level humidity errors were large. If the instabilities of the surface and vertical mixing into clouds are considered important factors affecting the estimation of PBLH into model, then mid- and low-level humidity should also be considered important factors influencing PBLH simulation performance.

• Atmosphere
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• v.31 no.1
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• pp.85-100
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• 2021

The necessity of accurate high-resolution meteorological forecasts becomes increasing in socio-economical applications and disaster risk management. The Korea Meteorological Administration Post-Processing (KMAPP) system has been operated to provide high-resolution meteorological forecasts of 100 m over the South Korea region. This study evaluates and improves the KMAPP performance in simulating wind speeds over complex terrain areas using the ICE-POP 2018 field campaign measurements. The mountainous measurements give a unique opportunity to evaluate the operational wind speed forecasts over the complex terrain area. The one-month wintertime forecasts revealed that the operational Local Data Assimilation and Prediction System (LDAPS) has systematic errors over the complex mountainous area, especially in deep valley areas, due to the orographic smoothing effect. The KMAPP reproduced the orographic height variation over the complex terrain area but failed to reduce the wind speed forecast errors of the LDAPS model. It even showed unreasonable values (~0.1 m s-1) for deep valley sites due to topographic overcorrection. The model's static parameters have been revised and applied to the KMAPP-Wind system, developed newly in this study, to represent the local topographic characteristics better over the region. Besides, sensitivity tests were conducted to investigate the effects of the model's physical correction methods. The KMAPP-Wind system showed better performance in predicting near-surface wind speed during the ICE-POP period than the original KMAPP version, reducing the forecast error by 21.2%. It suggests that a realistic representation of the topographic parameters is a prerequisite for the physical downscaling of near-ground wind speed over complex terrain areas.

• Atmosphere
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• v.32 no.2
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• pp.163-178
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• 2022

This study aims to evaluate the accuracy of retrieved horizontal winds with different quality control methods from three Doppler lidars deployed over the complex terrain during the PyeongChang 2018 Olympic and Paralympic games. To retrieve the accurate wind profile, this study also proposes two quality control methods to distinguish between meteorological signals and noises in the Doppler velocity field, which can be broadly applied to different Doppler lidars. We evaluated the accuracy of retrieved winds with the wind measurements from the nearby or collocated rawinsondes. The retrieved wind speed and direction show a good agreement with rawinsonde with a correlation coefficient larger than 0.9. This study minimized the sampling error in the wind evaluation and estimation, and found that the accuracy of retrieved winds can reach ~0.6 m s^-1 and 3° in the quasi-homogeneous wind condition. We expect that the retrieved horizontal winds can be used in the high-resolution analysis of the horizontal winds and provide an accurate wind profile for model evaluation or data assimilation purposes.

• Atmosphere
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• v.30 no.1
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• pp.31-46
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• 2020

The aircraft observation campaign was performed to investigate thermodynamic conditions of snowfall cloud over the East Sea of Korean peninsula from 2 February to 16 March 2018. During this period, four snowfall events occurred in the Yeongdong region and three cases were analyzed using dropsonde data. Snowfall cases were associated with the passage of southern low-pressure (maritime warm air mass) and expansion of northern high-pressure (continental polar air mass). Case 1 and Case 2a were related to low-pressure systems, and Case 2b and Case 3 were connected with high-pressure systems, respectively. And their thermodynamic properties and horizontal distribution of snowfall cloud were differed according to the influence of the synoptic condition. In Case 1 and Case 2a, atmospheric layers between sea surface and 350 hPa contained moisture more than 15 mm of TPW with multiple inversion layers detected by dropsonde data, while the vertical atmosphere of Case 2b and Case 3 were dry as TPW 5 mm or less with a single inversion inversion layer around 750~850 hPa. However, the vertical distributions of equivalent potential temperature (θ_e) were similar as moist-adiabatically neutral condition regardless of the case. But, their values below 900 hPa were about 10 K higher in Case 1 and Case 2a (285~290 K) than in Case 2b and Case 3 (275~280 K). The difference in these values is related to the characteristics of the incoming air mass and the location of the snowfall cloud.