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Seasonal Cycle of the Near-Surface Diurnal Wind Field Over the Bay of La Paz, Mexico

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Abstract

The results of numerical simulations of the troposphere over the Bay of La Paz, calculated for the months of January, April, July and October during the period 2006–2010 with the Weather Research and Forecast (WRF v3.5) regional model, are used to describe the seasonal features of the diurnal cycle of planetary boundary-layer winds. Two distinct near-surface diurnal flows with strong seasonal variability were identified: (1) a nocturnal and matutinal breeze directed from the subtropical Pacific Ocean, over the Baja California peninsula and the Bay of La Paz, into the Gulf of California that is associated with the regional sea-surface temperature difference between those two major water bodies; and (2) a mid to late afternoon onshore sea-breeze related to the peninsula’s daily cycle of insolation heating that evolves with counter-clockwise rotation over the Bay of La Paz. The model results reveal the interaction over Baja California of opposing afternoon sea-breeze fronts that originate from the subtropical Pacific Ocean and the Gulf of California, with a convergence line forming over the peaks of the peninsula’s topography and the associated presence of a closed vertical circulation cell over the Bay of La Paz and the adjacent Gulf. The collision of the opposing sea-breeze fronts over the narrow peninsula drives convection that is relatively weak due to the reduced heat source and only appears to produce precipitation sporadically. The spatial structure of the sea-breeze fronts over the Bay of La Paz region is complex due to shoreline curvature and nearby topographic features. A comparison of the numerical results with available meteorological near-surface observations indicates that the modelling methodology adequately reproduced the observed features of the seasonal variability of the local planetary boundary-layer diurnal wind cycle and confirms that the low-level atmospheric circulation over the Bay of La Paz is dominated by kinetic energy in the diurnal band. The strongest (weakest) diurnal flows occur during the summer (winter) in response to the seasonally varying magnitudes of the daily land–sea thermal contrast and the regional subtropical Pacific Ocean–Gulf of California sea-surface temperature difference.

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Notes

  1. The unified NOAH Land Surface Model was developed through collaborations from the National Center for Atmospheric Research, the National Centers for Environmental Prediction, Oregon State University and the Air Force Weather Agency.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the Mexican National Science and Technology Council (CONACyT) through a postdoctoral grant to the first author (Reference No. 82741) and by Research Grants from the National Polytechnic Institute (SIP–IPN Projects No. 20101287 and 20111073). We are grateful for the insightful comments of an anonymous reviewer and to the Northwest Biological Research Centre (CIBNOR) and the Mexican National Water Commission for providing the meteorological surface station data. The Matlab mapping package ‘M_Map’, developed by Dr. Rich Pawlowicz and available online at http://www.eos.ubc.ca/~rich/map.html, was used to produce some of the figures presented in this paper.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Departamento de Oceanografía Física, Centro de Investigación Científica y de Educación Superior de Ensenada, Carretera Ensenada-Tijuana No. 3918, Zona Playitas, Ensenada, C.P. 22860, B.C., Mexico

    Cuauhtémoc Turrent

  2. Departamento de Oceanología, Centro Interdisciplinario de Ciencias Marinas–Instituto Politécnico Nacional, La Paz, Mexico

    Oleg Zaitsev

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  1. Cuauhtémoc Turrent
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Correspondence to Cuauhtémoc Turrent.

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Turrent, C., Zaitsev, O. Seasonal Cycle of the Near-Surface Diurnal Wind Field Over the Bay of La Paz, Mexico. Boundary-Layer Meteorol 151, 353–371 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10546-014-9908-4

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