• The Sea:JOURNAL OF THE KOREAN SOCIETY OF OCEANOGRAPHY
• /
• v.28 no.4
• /
• pp.121-132
• /
• 2023

Marine heatwaves (MHWs), referring to anomalously high sea surface temperatures, have drawn significant attention from marine scientists due to their broad impacts on the surface marine ecosystem, fisheries, weather patterns, and various human activities. In this study, we examined the impact of the distribution of Changjiang diluted water (CDW), a significant factor causing oceanic property changes in the East China Sea (ECS) during the summer, on MHWs. The surface salinity distribution in the ECS indicates that from June to August, the eastern extension of the CDW influences areas as far as Jeju Island and the Korea Strait. In September, however, the CDW tends to reside in the Changjiang estuary. Through the Empirical Orthogonal Function analysis of the cumulative intensity of MHWs during the summer, we extracted the loading vector of the first mode and its principal component time series to conduct a correlation analysis with the distribution of the CDW. The results revealed a strong negative spatial correlation between areas of the CDW and regions with high cumulative intensity of MHWs, indicating that the reinforcement of stratification due to low-salinity water can increase the intensity and duration of MHWs. This study suggests that the CDW may still influence the spatial distribution of MHWs in the region, highlighting the importance of oceanic environmental factors in the occurrence of MHWs in the waters surrounding the Korean Peninsula.

• Korean Journal of Remote Sensing
• /
• v.38 no.4
• /
• pp.355-364
• /
• 2022

In this study a tendency of abnormal sea surface temperature (SST) occurrence in the seas around South Korea is analyzed from daily SST data from satellite and 14 buoys from August 2020 to July 2021. As thresholds 28℃ and 4℃ are used to determine marine heatwaves(MHWs) and abnormal low water temperature (ALWT), respectively, because those values are adopted by the National Institute of Fisheries Science for the breaking news of abnormal temperature. In order to calculate frequency of abnormal SST occurrence spatially by using satellite SST, research area was divided into six areas of coast and three open seas. ALWT dominantly appeared over a wide area (7,745 km²) in Gyeonggi Bay for total 94 days and it was also confirmed from buoy temperature showing an occurrence number of 47 days. MHWs tended to be high in frequency in the coastal areas of Chungcheongdo and Jeollabukdo and the south coastal areas while in case of buoy temperature Jupo was the place of high frequency (32 days). This difference was supposed to be due to the low accuracy of satellite SST at the coasts. MHWs are also dominant in offshore waters around Korean Peninsula. Although detecting abnormal SST by using satellite SST has advantage of understanding occurrence from a spatial point of view, we also need to perform detection using buoys to increase detection accuracy along the coast.

• The Sea:JOURNAL OF THE KOREAN SOCIETY OF OCEANOGRAPHY
• /
• v.29 no.2
• /
• pp.101-115
• /
• 2024

The ocean heatwave is emerging as a major issue due to global warming, posing a direct threat to marine ecosystems and humanity through decreased food resources and reduced carbon absorption capacity of the oceans. Consequently, the prediction of ocean heatwaves in the vicinity of the Korean Peninsula is becoming increasingly important for marine environmental monitoring and management. In this study, an LSTM model was developed to improve the underestimated prediction of ocean heatwaves caused by the coarse vertical grid system of the Korean Peninsula Ocean Prediction System. Based on the results of ocean heatwave predictions for the Korean Peninsula conducted in 2023, as well as those generated by the LSTM model, the performance of heatwave predictions in the East Sea, Yellow Sea, and South Sea areas surrounding the Korean Peninsula was evaluated. The LSTM model developed in this study significantly improved the prediction performance of sea surface temperatures during periods of temperature increase in all three regions. However, its effectiveness in improving prediction performance during periods of temperature decrease or before temperature rise initiation was limited. This demonstrates the potential of the LSTM model to address the underestimated prediction of ocean heatwaves caused by the coarse vertical grid system during periods of enhanced stratification. It is anticipated that the utility of data-driven artificial intelligence models will expand in the future to improve the prediction performance of dynamical models or even replace them.

• Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences
• /
• v.26 no.11
• /
• pp.639-648
• /
• 2023

The sea surface temperature (SST) and ocean heat content in the Korea Waters are gradually increased. Especially the increasing trend of annual mean SST in the Korea Water is higher about 2.6 times than the global mean during past 55 years (1968-2022). Before 2010s, the increasing trend of SST was led by winter season in the Korea Waters. However, this pattern was clearly changed after 2010s. The increasing trend of SST during summer is higher about 3.9 times than during winter after 2010s. We examine the long-term variations of several ocean and climate factors to understand the reasons for the long-term pattern changes of SST between summer and winter in recent. Tsushima warm current was significantly strengthened in summer compare to winter during past 33 years (1986-2018). The long-term patterns of Siberian High and East Asian Winter Monsoon were definitely changed before and after early- or mid-2000s. The intensities of those two climate factors was changed to the increasing trend or weakened decreasing trend from the distinctive decreasing trend. In addition, the extreme weather condition like the heatwave days and cold spell days in the Korea significantly increased since mid- or late-2000s. From these results, we can consider that the occurrences of frequent and intensified marine heatwaves during summer and marine cold spells during winter in the Korea Waters might be related with the long-term pattern change of SST, which should be caused by the long-term change of climate factors and advection heat, in a few decade.