These two papers analyze extreme upward air currents, called “convective bursts,” in hurricanes that have been believed to be important for hurricane intensification. We use the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model to look at convective bursts in two hurricanes: Hurricane Dean from 2007 and Hurricane Bill from 2009. In the first paper, we study how convective bursts form, and in the second paper, we analyze how the convective bursts affected the intensity of the two hurricanes.
Important Conclusions:
1. Convective bursts form when the hurricane eyewall, the ring of thunderstorms around the center, goes from a circular to an oval shape.
2. Convective bursts near or in the eyewall of a hurricane tend to lead to intensification of the hurricane.
3. Small-scale features such as these are hard to observe; we need to continue to improve both observations and models to better understand how they work and how they impact hurricanes.
Part I is available at http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/MWR-D-16-0267.1, and Part II at http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/MWR-D-16-0268.1.
