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Atmospheric circulation associated with extreme generalized frosts persistence in central-southern South America

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Abstract

Generalized frosts (GF) in central-southern South America have a strong impact due to their spatial extension, and they are especially important when they become persistent. This paper aims at identifying the atmospheric circulation features that determine the extreme GF persistence, i.e. very persistent and without persistence, and the differences between them, during the 1961–1990 winters. Since the GF without persistence group outnumbers the other one, two subgroups are composed with events selected from winters with maximum and minimum frequency of GF occurrence, respectively. Additionally, the individual event of July 1988 within the very persistent GF group is analyzed due to its exceptional persistence. GF persistence is mainly conditioned by two large-scale dynamic factors. One is the Rossby wave train propagation across the Pacific Ocean, and the other one is the location with respect to the continent and the magnitude of the confluence in the jet entrance region in subtropical latitudes. A predominantly meridional Rossby wave train propagation with a confluence region to the west of the continent prior to the event favors GF with intermediate (null) persistence depending on the greater (lesser) jet acceleration. This is conditioned by the magnitude of the confluence, which, in turn, depends on the disposition of the wave train propagation pattern. Instead, an essentially zonal propagation with a confluence region to the east of the continent favors the GF persistence for several days, yet if there is no confluence the event does not persist. The greatest persistence of an event combines the confluence/diffluence of the jet entrance/exit region, which depends on the disposition with respect to the continent of the zonally propagating Rossby wave trains.

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Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful to the reviewers for their useful suggestions that contributed to improve the quality of this work. This work was partially supported by grants CONICET (PIP-114-200801-00591) and ANPCyT (PICT2005-38193).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centro de Investigaciones Científicas y Transferencia de Tecnología a la Producción, Diamante (CICYTTTP-CONICET), Materi y España, s/n, CP 3105, Diamante, Entre Ríos, Argentina

    Gabriela V. Müller

  2. Servicio Meteorológico Nacional - CONICET, Buenos Aires, Argentina

    Guillermo J. Berri

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  1. Gabriela V. Müller
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  2. Guillermo J. Berri
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Correspondence to Gabriela V. Müller.

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Gabriela V. Müller and Guillermo J. Berri are members of the National Research Council of Argentina (CONICET).

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Müller, G.V., Berri, G.J. Atmospheric circulation associated with extreme generalized frosts persistence in central-southern South America. Clim Dyn 38, 837–857 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-011-1113-2

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