engleski

Wind gust climatology over the Adriatic region

The global model reanalysis, forecast or climate data needs to be downscaled to provide information for regional interpretation. This is especially true in complex terrain of Croatia, where weather conditions are governed by the effects of mountains and the Adriatic Sea and the atmosphere. One of the climatological particularities of the region is related to bora winds, severe downslope windstorms, which are especially frequent in winter and may reach hurricane 5 scale gusts. Therefore, extreme bora events are a major threat to population safety and coastal infrastructure and are responsible for intense dense water formation in the Adriatic Sea. Dynamical downscaling of global reanalysis data was performed with the use of ALADIN model at the final grid spacing of 2 km during a 10-yearly period. Moment-based and spectral verification of wind speed, performed on a number of surface stations in different climate regions of Croatia, suggested that downscaling was successful. The highest wind gusts of over 68 m/s were simulated near the lee of the southern Velebit Mountain, in an excellent agreement with the intensity and location of the highest observed maximal gusts. Results suggest ALADIN wind and wind gust climatology is appropriate for using in studies of air-sea interaction and hydrological cycle over the Adriatic where the observed data is scarce, as well as for a range of other purposes such as infrastructure planning and offshore wind resource potential estimates.

wind, climatology, ALADIN, downscaling

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