Simulation of Near-Equatorial Typhoon Vamei

The paper reports preliminary results of simulation of Typhoon Vamei which landed at the southern tip of Johor on December 27, 2001. Using an 8-processors Linux- based Beowulf cluster, the cyclogenesis and the evolution of the system was successfully simulated using the 5th Generation of PSU/NCAR Mesoscale Model (MM5). Driven by the operational products of Navy Operational Global Atmospheric Prediction System (NOGAPS), the MM5-simulated typhoon showed good agreement in the propagation track as well as with local station observations of accumulated rainfall distribution and surface pressure. The sensitivity experiments indicated that the oceanic latent heat transfer was crucial for the evolution of the system while surface sensible heat transfer had less significant impact. The propagation track of Vamei was less influenced by the regional orgraphic structure although the speed of its westward propagation appeared to be much reduced.