Composite diurnal cycle frequency distribution of rain rates analyzed from radars on board the Research Vessels Roger Revelle (top) and Mirai (bottom). The color shading indicates the percentage of samples within each bin of rainfall intensity and each hourly bin of local time. Credit: Kerns and Chen, 2018, Figure 2c and 2d
Source: Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres

Diurnal precipitation over the oceans has been known to maximize in the night, in contrast to the afternoon maximum over most land areas. Kerns and Chen [2018] find that over the equatorial Indian Ocean, an afternoon secondary maximum exists in addition to the nocturnal maximum. This secondary maximum has rainfall rate larger than 10 millimeters per day. It occurs under conditions of light surface winds and suppressed phase of large-scale convection. This secondary maximum is caused by short-lived convective systems that are not captured in the Tropical Rainfall Measurement Mission satellite data.

Citation: Kerns, B. W., & Chen, S. S. [2018]. Diurnal Cycle of Precipitation and Cloud Clusters in the MJO and ITCZ over the Indian Ocean. Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, 123. https://doi.org/10.1029/2018JD028589

—Minghua Zhang, Editor-in-Chief, JGR: Atmospheres

Text © 2018. The authors. CC BY-NC-ND 3.0
Except where otherwise noted, images are subject to copyright. Any reuse without express permission from the copyright owner is prohibited.