Elizabeth Warfield
Florida Gulf Coast University
Research Mentor: Yolande L. Serra
Project: Easterly Wave Modulation of Surface Meteorology of Costa Rica
My name is Elizabeth Warfield, and I am a senior at Florida Gulf Coast University. I am seeking a BA in Environmental Studies and double minor in Geology and Climate Change. This summer I had the privilege of working with Dr. Yolande Serra and the rest of the research team, all a part of the Organization of Tropical East Pacific Convection (OTREC). My internship was completed remotely apart from the last week we’re flown out to Seattle to hold our own CICOES Conference to share our work with other mentors, interns, and CICOES faculty.
The purpose of the OTREC team was to create a better understanding for Easterly Wave modulation and its possible relation to mesoscale convective systems (MCS) across Costa Rica, due to the flood concerns as well as tropical cyclones. We utilized thermodynamic variables tracked by 15 meteorological-GPS stations and NOAA’s GOES-16 satellite for cloud top temperature (CTT). My project, within this, had focused on how precipitable water vapor (PWV) and CTT were indicators of the occurrence of deep convection, leading to large, organized systems.
Easterly waves travel from east to west off the coast of Africa and are commonly associated with tropical cyclonic activity. These waves are tracked using outgoing longwave radiation data to track the active and suppressed phases of the waves. The active phase is found within the trough of the waves and the suppressed was found in the ridge and the neutral phase fell right in between. The importance of this was to determine if the MCS’s were more commonly associated with a specific phase of the wave. We had found that at the coastal sites (Caribbean and Pacific) there was an increase in PWV over 24 hours during the Active phase, while during the Suppressed phase drying occurs. The Active phase also results in moister conditions than the Suppressed phase at these locations. In the center of Costa Rica, PWV was also greater for the Active phase than for the Suppressed phase, but progressive moistening (drying) for the Active (Suppressed) phase was not as evident as at the coastal sites. The center of Costa Rica had a variety of high and low elevations from the mountain ranges and valleys. This topographic observation along with the thermodynamic variables measured, will be further researched as to why they experience different results than the coastal sites. The CTT data exhibited lower values (colder cloud tops) at all sites during the Active phase compared to the Neutral or Suppressed phases, indicating that convection was most intense during the Active phase.
I have thoroughly enjoyed my experience with Dr. Yolande Serra and the rest of the team that I got to work with. I look forward to further expand on my interest with Tropical Convective Systems and appreciate the experience that CICOES offered for me. This is truly an exceptional opportunity for anyone looking to gain field experience and to find what about climate science peaks your interest.
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