Seasonal variation of the ITCZ and its characteristics over central Africa

Suzuki, Tsuneaki

doi:10.1007/s00704-010-0276-9

Cited by 52 publications

(33 citation statements)

References 25 publications

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“…During January, February, and March, the southern half receives more precipitation, while April is a transitional month with maximum rainfall in the western-central and northeastern areas of the basin. From May to August, the rainfall pattern appears homogeneous, and the majority of the average precipitation occurs in the northern area, which coincides with the northward excursion of the ITCZ between February and August (Nicholson and Grist, 2003;Suzuki, 2011). From May to October, the northeastern CRB receives the highest rainfall, which favours the Oubangui catchment, a right-bank tributary of the Congo River that drains an area of 488 500 km 2 at the Bangui gauge station (Runge and Nguimalet, 2005).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 91%

“…The atmospheric divergence and convergence patterns are associated with high-pressure systems and low pressures at the Equator and in the ITCZ. The deep convection of the ITCZ depends on the contribution of water vapour from the surface moisture flux, which is supplied as surface latent heat flux, and the horizontal moisture flux in the lower free atmosphere (Suzuki, 2011). The VIMF identifies moisture that reaches the CRB from divergence zones over the Sahel and the Arabian Sea.…”

Section: Identification Of the Moisture Sourcesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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A Lagrangian perspective of the hydrological cycle in the Congo River basin

et al. 2017

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Abstract. The Lagrangian model FLEXPART is used to identify the moisture sources of the Congo River basin (CRB) and investigate their role in the hydrological cycle. This model allows us to track atmospheric parcels while calculating changes in the specific humidity through the budget of evaporation minus precipitation. This method permits the annual-scale identification of five continental and four oceanic principal regions that provide moisture to the CRB from both hemispheres over the course of the year. The most important is the CRB, which provides more than 50 % of the total atmospheric moisture contribution to precipitation over itself. Additionally, both the land that extends to the east of the CRB and the eastern equatorial South Atlantic Ocean are very important sources, while the Red Sea source is merely important in the (E − P ) budget over the CRB despite its high evaporation rate. The moisture-sink patterns over the CRB in air masses that were tracked forward in time from all the sources follow the latitudinal rainfall migration and are mostly highly correlated with the pattern of the precipitation rate, ensuring a link between them. In wet (dry) years, the contribution of moisture to precipitation from the CRB over itself increases (decreases). Despite the enhanced evaporative conditions over the basin during dry years, the vertically integrated moisture flux (VIMF) divergence inhibits precipitation and suggests the transport of moisture from the CRB to remote regions.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 91%

Section: Identification Of the Moisture Sourcesmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Lagrangian perspective of the hydrological cycle in the Congo River basin

et al. 2017

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“…Recent studies, mainly using reanalysis datasets, have identified prominent drivers of regional circulation (Suzuki 2011;Pokam et al 2014;Neupane 2016) and the water cycle (McCollum et al 2000;Pokam et al 2012), demonstrating an important interaction with the Atlantic Ocean (Hirst and Hastenrath 1983a;Dezfuli et al 2015), and possible remote drivers including Indo-Pacific SSTs (Hua et al 2016). During the main rainy season, SON, low-level westerlies (LLWs) from the eastern equatorial Atlantic play a key role in moisture provision .…”

Section: Pan-africanmentioning

confidence: 99%

Evaluating Climate Models with an African Lens

James

Washington

Abiodun

et al. 2018

Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society

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“…2). Presumably, this relates to the timing of wet and dry seasons (driven by the Intertropical Con vergence Zone (Suzuki, 2010)), however it is unclear why São Tomé and Príncipe have asynchronous birth pulses when their climates are so similar (Deutscher Wetterdienst, 2016).…”

Section: Seasonal Variation In Roost Location Size and Compositionmentioning

confidence: 99%