The International research Institute for Climate prediction Linking Science to Society IRI Technical REport No. 02-06 The Effect of Regional Climate Model Domain Choice on the Simulation of Tropical Cyclone-Like Vortices in the Southwestern Indian Ocean December 2002 The earth institute columbia university in the city of new york Image Credit: The satellite image on the front cover shows Tropical Cyclone Dina located over the Indian Ocean on 1/22/02. Image courtesy of NOAA. The IRI was established as a cooperative agreement between U.S. NOAA Office of Global Programs and Columbia University. The Effect of Regional Climate Model Domain Choice on the Simulation of Tropical Cyclone-Like Vortices in the Southwestern Indian Ocean W. A. LANDMAN, A. SETH and S. J. CAMARGO International Research Institute for Climate Prediction, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, Columbia University, Palisades, New York, USA E-mail:
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[email protected] Tel : 845-680-4416 Fax : 845-680-4865 December 17, 2002 1 Abstract While GCMs do simulate tropical cyclone-like vortex tracks in the southern Indian Ocean, they do not capture well those which make landfall in southern Africa. The feasibility of using a nested modelling system to produce seasonal tropical cyclone forecasts is examined, since improved horizontal resolution may potentially improve simulated cyclone tracks. As a first approach, a regional climate model is driven by time-dependent large-scale meteorological analyses for several domain configurations.