the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
| 28 May 2024
A global climatology of sting-jet extratropical cyclones
Abstract. Sting jets have been identified in the most damaging extratropical cyclones impacting northwest Europe. Unlike the cold conveyor belt and other long-lived cyclone wind jets, sting jets can lead to regions of exceptionally strong near-surface winds, and damaging gusts, over just a few hours and with much smaller wind “footprints”. They descend into the frontal-fracture region found in warm-seclusion cyclones. Previous research has focused almost exclusively on North Atlantic-European cyclones, but there are no known physical reasons why sting jets should not develop elsewhere and recognition of their existence can inform weather nowcasting and wind warnings. We have produced the first climatology of sting-jet cyclones over the major ocean basins. A sting-jet precursor diagnostic has been applied to more than 10,000 warm-seclusion cyclones in the top intensity decile, tracked using 43 extended-winters of ERA5 reanalysis data. Cyclones with sting-jet precursors are found to occur over the North Pacific and Southern Oceans for the first time and they are more prevalent in the Northern Hemisphere (27 % of all top decile cyclones) compared to the Southern Hemisphere (15 %). These cyclones have distinct characteristics to those without the precursor including initiating closer to the equator, deepening faster in mean-sea-level pressure and having stronger near-surface winds, even in the reanalysis data which is too coarse to resolve sting jets. Composite analysis reveals systematic differences in structural evolution, including in potential vorticity and jet crossing. These differences evidence the climatological consequences of strong diabatic cloud processes on cyclone characteristics, implying that sting jets are likely to be enhanced by climate change.
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Notice on discussion status
The requested preprint has a corresponding peer-reviewed final revised paper. You are encouraged to refer to the final revised version.
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Preprint
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The requested preprint has a corresponding peer-reviewed final revised paper. You are encouraged to refer to the final revised version.
- Preprint
(9180 KB) - Metadata XML
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Supplement
(2864 KB) - BibTeX
- EndNote
- Final revised paper
Journal article(s) based on this preprint
Interactive discussion
Status: closed
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RC1: 'Comment on egusphere-2024-1413', Emmanouil Flaounas, 08 Jul 2024
Review of the paper "A global climatology of sting-jet extratropical cyclones" by Gray et al., 2024.
I read the paper with great interest and I found it helpful and insightful, providing a richness of interesting results. A global climatology of sting-jet cyclones was indeed missing from the state of the art and this paper provides an overview of these systems' structural characteristics and insights into their dynamics. I have comments and suggestions of minor nature on the organization of the manuscript that I leave to the authors discretion if they want to follow them.
Section 2 is clearly described, albeit complicated and long. Complexity is not due to language or presentation, but due to the large amount of knowledge and techniques that someone needs to understand and be already familiar with. Probably sections 2.1, 2.3 and 2.6 could go together. Then, sections 2.2 and 2.4 could form a separate (sub)section which could be supported with schematics or flowcharts so that the reader can conceptually understand the role of different dynamical features in sting-jets. A subsequent subsection could use real cases as examples (now figures 1 to 3) to demonstrate the complexity of the exercise and what is expected in realistic datasets. Finally, section 2.5 although it is important it could be moved to supplement or an appendix.
I am not sure there are many(any?) climatologies of warm seclusions (SJP+nSJP). It would be useful to know a bit more on how they compare spatially to other intense cyclones.
Section 3.1: If most SJP cyclones include a sting jet and if ERA5 may partly resolve these sting jets, then is it possible that sting jets are responsible for higher relative vorticity at 850 hPa in the center of the cyclones in T63 resolution? If so, then SJP cyclones should anyway be more intense than other cyclones (if we use relative vorticity as an intensity metric). A reply comes later in section 3.4, so I am wondering if this section should be merged with 3.4? (Please also see next comment on section 3.6).
Section 3.6: seems a bit weaker and detached from the rest of the paper and is only confirming that SJP cyclones inlcude higher wind speeds. I am wondering if there should be a unique subsection that discusses the intensity of the cyclones involved in this analysis (i.e. merging current sections 3.1, 3.4 and 3.6).
Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-1413-RC1 -
RC2: 'Comment on egusphere-2024-1413', Anonymous Referee #2, 27 Aug 2024
This is a really great paper detailing a new climatology of sting jet cyclones considering all ocean basins (rather than just the North Atlantic region that has already received quite a bit of attention). The climatology is produced using a subset of intense cyclones that contain a warm seclusion. The sting jet precursor is calculated for each storm and some additional criteria used to determine the cyclones with the potential for producing sting jets. The analysis includes the spatial and temporal variability of the storms, the distributions of their characteristics, and composites of their structure.
The paper is well-written and contains thorough analysis and interesting results and conclusions. A key point is that sting jet cyclones seem to be possible in all ocean basins, and not just in the North Atlantic European region on which case studies have usually focused.
I have a few minor comments and suggestions.
- Line 43: Add reference for Norwegian model.
- Line 53: “There is published…” -> “there is no published…”.
- Lines 132-139: I think the watershed algorithm could be explained or described in a bit more detail. How are the watersheds defined?
- Line 151: Something strange with the section numbering – think this should be 2.5 (rather than 22.5).
- Figure 1: This figure is a bit too small to see the necessary details in order to understand the method. Is there a way to make this larger?
- Line 164: This sentence doesn’t seem to read correctly.
- Figure 2 caption end – similar problem with section numbering.
- Line 337: Here it is pointed out that the nSJP cyclones have higher cyclogenesis in the secondary cyclogenesis regions. Later on it is suggested that the SJP cyclones have higher proportion of secondary cyclogenesis, indicated by the MSLP composites. It would be good to test the hypothesis given later (line 419), as these statements seem to be a little contradictory.
- Line 354: How is the significance tested here?
- Line 428: I think this is a really interesting result and it is nice to see it highlighted in the conclusions.
- Line 502: “faster” -> “higher”.
Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-1413-RC2 -
AC1: 'Comment on egusphere-2024-1413', Suzanne L. Gray, 20 Sep 2024
The comment was uploaded in the form of a supplement: https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2024/egusphere-2024-1413/egusphere-2024-1413-AC1-supplement.pdf
Interactive discussion
Status: closed
-
RC1: 'Comment on egusphere-2024-1413', Emmanouil Flaounas, 08 Jul 2024
Review of the paper "A global climatology of sting-jet extratropical cyclones" by Gray et al., 2024.
I read the paper with great interest and I found it helpful and insightful, providing a richness of interesting results. A global climatology of sting-jet cyclones was indeed missing from the state of the art and this paper provides an overview of these systems' structural characteristics and insights into their dynamics. I have comments and suggestions of minor nature on the organization of the manuscript that I leave to the authors discretion if they want to follow them.
Section 2 is clearly described, albeit complicated and long. Complexity is not due to language or presentation, but due to the large amount of knowledge and techniques that someone needs to understand and be already familiar with. Probably sections 2.1, 2.3 and 2.6 could go together. Then, sections 2.2 and 2.4 could form a separate (sub)section which could be supported with schematics or flowcharts so that the reader can conceptually understand the role of different dynamical features in sting-jets. A subsequent subsection could use real cases as examples (now figures 1 to 3) to demonstrate the complexity of the exercise and what is expected in realistic datasets. Finally, section 2.5 although it is important it could be moved to supplement or an appendix.
I am not sure there are many(any?) climatologies of warm seclusions (SJP+nSJP). It would be useful to know a bit more on how they compare spatially to other intense cyclones.
Section 3.1: If most SJP cyclones include a sting jet and if ERA5 may partly resolve these sting jets, then is it possible that sting jets are responsible for higher relative vorticity at 850 hPa in the center of the cyclones in T63 resolution? If so, then SJP cyclones should anyway be more intense than other cyclones (if we use relative vorticity as an intensity metric). A reply comes later in section 3.4, so I am wondering if this section should be merged with 3.4? (Please also see next comment on section 3.6).
Section 3.6: seems a bit weaker and detached from the rest of the paper and is only confirming that SJP cyclones inlcude higher wind speeds. I am wondering if there should be a unique subsection that discusses the intensity of the cyclones involved in this analysis (i.e. merging current sections 3.1, 3.4 and 3.6).
Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-1413-RC1 -
RC2: 'Comment on egusphere-2024-1413', Anonymous Referee #2, 27 Aug 2024
This is a really great paper detailing a new climatology of sting jet cyclones considering all ocean basins (rather than just the North Atlantic region that has already received quite a bit of attention). The climatology is produced using a subset of intense cyclones that contain a warm seclusion. The sting jet precursor is calculated for each storm and some additional criteria used to determine the cyclones with the potential for producing sting jets. The analysis includes the spatial and temporal variability of the storms, the distributions of their characteristics, and composites of their structure.
The paper is well-written and contains thorough analysis and interesting results and conclusions. A key point is that sting jet cyclones seem to be possible in all ocean basins, and not just in the North Atlantic European region on which case studies have usually focused.
I have a few minor comments and suggestions.
- Line 43: Add reference for Norwegian model.
- Line 53: “There is published…” -> “there is no published…”.
- Lines 132-139: I think the watershed algorithm could be explained or described in a bit more detail. How are the watersheds defined?
- Line 151: Something strange with the section numbering – think this should be 2.5 (rather than 22.5).
- Figure 1: This figure is a bit too small to see the necessary details in order to understand the method. Is there a way to make this larger?
- Line 164: This sentence doesn’t seem to read correctly.
- Figure 2 caption end – similar problem with section numbering.
- Line 337: Here it is pointed out that the nSJP cyclones have higher cyclogenesis in the secondary cyclogenesis regions. Later on it is suggested that the SJP cyclones have higher proportion of secondary cyclogenesis, indicated by the MSLP composites. It would be good to test the hypothesis given later (line 419), as these statements seem to be a little contradictory.
- Line 354: How is the significance tested here?
- Line 428: I think this is a really interesting result and it is nice to see it highlighted in the conclusions.
- Line 502: “faster” -> “higher”.
Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-1413-RC2 -
AC1: 'Comment on egusphere-2024-1413', Suzanne L. Gray, 20 Sep 2024
The comment was uploaded in the form of a supplement: https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2024/egusphere-2024-1413/egusphere-2024-1413-AC1-supplement.pdf
Peer review completion
Journal article(s) based on this preprint
Model code and software
Code to calculate DSCAPE from vertical profiles Oscar Martínez-Alvarado https://github.com/omartineza/csisounding
The TRACK cyclone identification and tracking algorithm Kevin Hodges https://gitlab.act.reading.ac.uk/track/
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Suzanne Louise Gray
Ambrogio Volonté
Oscar Martínez-Alvarado
Ben J. Harvey
The requested preprint has a corresponding peer-reviewed final revised paper. You are encouraged to refer to the final revised version.
- Preprint
(9180 KB) - Metadata XML
-
Supplement
(2864 KB) - BibTeX
- EndNote
- Final revised paper