Abstract
Fifty-seven days of moored current records are examined, focusing on the sequential passage of Typhoons Nesat and Nalgae separated by 5 days in the northwestern South China Sea. Both typhoons generated strong near-inertial waves (NIW) as detected by a moored array, with the near-inertial velocity to the right of the typhoon path significantly larger than to the left. The estimated vertical phase and group velocities of the NIW induced by Typhoon Nesat are 0.2 cm s−1 and 0.85 m h−1, respectively, corresponding to a vertical wavelength of 350 m. Both the vertical phase and group velocities of the NIW induced by Typhoon Nalgae are lower than those of Typhoon Nesat, with the corresponding vertical wavelength only one-half that of Nesat. The threshold values of induced near-inertial kinetic energy (NIKE) of 5 J m−3 reach water depths of 300 and 200 m for Typhoons Nesat and Nalgae, respectively, illustrating that the NIKE induced by Typhoon Nesat dissipated less with depth. Obvious blueshifts in the induced NIW frequencies are also detected. The frequency of NIW induced by Typhoon Nesat significantly increases at water depths of 100–150 m because of Doppler shifting, but decreases significantly at water depths of 100–150 m for Nalgae because of the greater influence of the background vorticity during the passage of Typhoon Nalgae.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Alford M H, Gregg M C. 2001. Near-inertial mixing: Modulation of shear, strain and microstructure at low latitude. J Geophys Res, 106: 16947–16968
Alford M H, Cronin M F, Klymak J M. 2012. Annual cycle and depth penetration of wind-generated near-inertial internal waves at ocean station Papa in the Northeast Pacific. J Phys Oceanogr, 42: 889–909
Brooks D A. 1983. The wake of Hurricane Allen in the western Gulf of Mexico. J Phys Oceanogr, 13: 117–129
Burchard H, Rippeth T P. 2009. Generation of bulk shear spikes in shallow stratified tidal seas. J Phys Oceanogr, 39: 969–985
Chen G X, Xue H J, Wang D X, **e Q. 2013. Observed near-inertial kinetic energy in the northwestern South China Sea. J Geophys Res-Oceans, 118: 4965–4977
Cuypers Y, Le Vaillant X, Bouruet-Aubertot P, Vialard J, McPhaden M J. 2013. Tropical storm-induced near-inertial internal waves during the Cirene experiment: Energy fluxes and impact on vertical mixing. J Geophys Res-Oceans, 118: 358–380
D’Asaro E A. 1995. Upper ocean inerital currents forced by a strong storm. Part II: Modelling. J Phys Oceanogr, 25: 2937–2952
D’Asaro E A. 2003. The ocean boundary layer below Hurricane Dennis. J Phys Oceanogr, 33: 561–579
Federiuk J, Allen J S. 1996. Model studies of near-inertial waves in flow over the Oregon continental shelf. J Phys Oceanogr, 26: 2053–2075
Firing E, Lien R C, Muller P. 1997. Observations of strong inertial oscillations after the passage of Tropical Cyclone Ofa. J Geophys Res, 102: 3317–3322
Furuichi N, Hibiya T, Niwa Y. 2008. Model-predicted distribution of windinduced internal wave energy in the world’s oceans. J Geophys Res, 113: C09034
Gao D L, Wang X Y, Li B T, Lv X Q. 2016. On the response of the upper ocean of Northern South China Sea to typhoon Nalgae. J Ocean Univ China, 46: 8–13
Gardner W D, Blakey J C, Walsh I D, Richardson M J, Pegau S, Zaneveld J R V, Roesler C, Gregg M C, MacKinnon J A, Sosik H M, Williams Iii A J. 2001. Optics, particles, stratification, and storms on the New England continental shelf. J Geophys Res, 106: 9473–9497
Geisler J E. 1970. Linear theory of the response of a two layer ocean to a moving hurricane. Geophys Fluid Dyn, 1: 249–272
Gill A E. 1984. On the behavior of internal waves in the wakes of storms. J Phys Oceanogr, 14: 1129–1151
Huang N E, Shen Z, Long S R, Wu M C, Shih H H, Zheng Q, Yen N C, Tung C C, Liu H H. 1998. The empirical mode decomposition and the Hilbert spectrum for nonlinear and non-stationary time series analysis. Proc R Soc A-Math Phys Eng Sci, 454: 903–995
Jacob S D, Shay L K. 2003. The role of oceanic mesoscale features on the tropical cyclone-induced mixed layer response: A case study. J Phys Oceanogr, 33: 649–676
Jaimes B, Shay L K. 2009. Mixed layer cooling in mesoscale oceanic eddies during hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Mon Weather Rev, 137: 4188–4207
Kobayashi N, Zhao H, Tega Y. 2005. Suspended sand transport in surf zones. J Geophys Res, 110: C12009
Kunze E. 1985. Near-inertial wave propagation in geostrophic shear. J Phys Oceanogr, 15: 544–565
Lu S L, Li H, Liu Z H, Cao M J, Wu X F, Sun Z H, Xu J P. 2017. User Manual of Global Ocean Argo Gridded Datasets. 26
Pollard R T. 1970. On the generation by winds of inertial waves in the ocean. Deep Sea Res Oceanogr-Abstract, 17: 795–812
Price J F. 1981. Upper ocean response to a hurricane. J Phys Oceanogr, 11: 153–175
Price J F. 1983. Internal wave wake of a moving storm. Part I. Scales, energy budget and observations. J Phys Oceanogr, 13: 949–965
Price J F, Sanford T B, Forristall G Z. 1994. Forced stage response to a moving hurricane. J Phys Oceanogr, 24: 233–260
Sanford T B, Price J F, Girton J B. 2011. Upper-ocean response to hurricane Frances (2004) observed by profiling EM-APEX floats. J Phys Oceanogr, 41: 1041–1056
Shay L K, Elsberry R L. 1987. Near-inertial ocean current response to Hurricane Frederic. J Phys Oceanogr, 17: 1249–1269
Shearman R K. 2005. Observations of near-inertial current variability on the New England shelf. J Geophys Res, 110: C02012
Sriver R L, Huber M. 2007. Observational evidence for an ocean heat pump induced by tropical cyclones. Nature, 447: 577–580
Sun L, Zheng Q A, Tang T Y, Chuang W S, Li L, Hu J Y, Wang D X. 2012. Upper ocean near-inertial response to 1998 Typhoon Faith in the South China Sea. Acta Oceanol Sin, 31: 25–32
Walker N D, Leben R R, Balasubramanian S. 2005. Hurricane-forced upwelling and chlorophyll a enhancement within cold-core cyclones in the Gulf of Mexico. Geophys Res Lett, 32: L18610
Xu Z H, Yin B S, Hou Y J, Xu Y S. 2013. Variability of internal tides and near-inertial waves on the continental slope of the northwestern South China Sea. J Geophys Res-Oceans, 118: 197–211
Yang B, Hou Y J. 2014. Near-inertial waves in the wake of 2011 Typhoon Nesat in the northern South China Sea. Acta Oceanol Sin, 33: 102–111
Yang Q X, Zhao W, Liang X F, Dong J H, Tian J W. 2017. Elevated mixing in the periphery of mesoscale eddies in the South China Sea. J Phys Oceanogr, 47: 895–907
Ying M, Zhang W, Yu H, Lu X Q, Feng J X, Fan Y X, Zhu Y T, Chen D Q. 2014. An overview of the China Meteorological Administration tropical cyclone database. J Atmos Ocean Technol, 31: 287–301
Zedler S E, Dickey T D, Doney S C, Price J F, Yu X, Mellor G L. 2002. Analyses and simulations of the upper ocean’s response to Hurricane Felix at the Bermuda Testbed Mooring site: 13–23 August 1995. J Geophys Res, 107: 25-1–25-29
Zhang S W, **e L L, Hou Y J, Zhao H, Yi X F. 2014a. Tropical storm-induced turbulent mixing and chlorophyll-a enhancement in the continental shelf southeast of Hainan Island. J Mar Syst, 129: 405–414
Zhang S W, **e L L, Zhao H, Hou Y J. 2014b. Tropical storm-forced nearinertial energy dissipation in the southeast continental shelf region of Hainan Island. Sci China Earth Sci, 57: 1879–1884
Zheng Y, Yue J, Sun X F, Chen J. 2012. Studies of filtering effect on internal solitary wave flow field data in the South China Sea using EMD. Adv Mater Res, 518-523: 1422–1425
Zhou L, Tian J W, Wang D X. 2005. Energy distributions of the large-scale horizontal currents caused by wind in the baroclinic ocean. Sci China Ser D-Earth Sci, 48: 2267–2275
Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 41676008 & 40876005), the National Key Research and Development Program of China (Grant No. 2016YFC14001403), and the National Program on Global Change and Air-Sea Interaction (Grant No. GASI-IPOVI-04).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Ma, Y., Zhang, S., Qi, Y. et al. Upper ocean near-inertial response to the passage of two sequential typhoons in the northwestern South China Sea. Sci. China Earth Sci. 62, 863–871 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11430-018-9292-3
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11430-018-9292-3