SAR Observation and Modeling of Gap Winds in the Prince William Sound of Alaska 英文参考文献.docVIP

Sensors 2008, 8, 4894-4914; DOI: 10.3390/s8084894 OPEN ACCESS sensors ISSN 1424-8220 /sensors Article SAR Observation and Modeling of Gap Winds in the Prince William Sound of Alaska Haibo Liu 1,*, Peter Q Olsson 1, 2 and Karl Volz 1, 2 1 Alaska Experimental Forecast Facility, University of Alaska Anchorage, 2811 Merrill Field Dr, Anchorage, Alaska 99508, USA 2 Alaska State Climate Center, Environmental and Natural Resources Institute, University of Alaska Anchorage, Alaska 99508, USA E-mails: haibo@ (H. L.) ; Olsson@ (P. Q O.) ; volz@ (K. V.) *Author to whom correspondence should be addressed; New address: Haibo@ International Research Institute for Climate and Society (IRI), The Earth Institute at Columbia University, 113D Monell, LDEO, 61 Route 9W, PO Box 1000, Palisades, NY 10964-8000; Tel. 845- 680-4416; Fax 845-680-4864 Received: 12 July 2008; in revised form: 19 August 2008 / Accepted: 20 August 2008 / Published: 22 August 2008 Abstract: Alaska’s Prince William Sound (PWS) is a unique locale tending to have strong gap winds, especially in the winter season. To characterize and understand these strong surface winds, which have great impacts on the local marine and aviation activities, the surface wind retrieval from the Synthetic Aperture Radar data (SAR-wind) is combined with a numerical mesoscale model. Helped with the SAR-wind observations, the mesoscale model is used to study cases of strong winds and relatively weak winds to depict the nature of these winds, including the area of extent and possible causes of the wind regimes. The gap winds from the Wells Passage and the Valdez Arm are the most dominant gap winds in PWS. Though the Valdez Arm is north-south trending and Wells Passage is east-west oriented, gap winds often develop simultaneously in these two places when a low pressure system is present in the Northern Gulf of Alaska. These two gap winds often converge