Visualization of tornado-like vortex interacting with wide tornado-break wall

Abstract

A three-dimensional CFD model, based on large eddy simulation, is utilized to numerically simulate a perpendicular interaction between a traveling tornado-like vortex and a wide rigid wall. The tornado-like flow is modeled by the Rankine-Combined Vortex Model. The case, where the wall width is much larger than the tornado vortex core diameter is examined. The main goal of the paper is to improve the understanding of the dynamics of the tornado-wall interaction. The conclusions drawn in this study are supported by various visualizations. During the tornado impact, the structure of the tornado-like vortex is substantially mitigated by the wide wall. The low-level portion of the vortex is disturbed both in front of the wall and behind the wall. When the vortex is approaching the wall, the vortex-induced velocities cause a boundary layer separation from the leading face of the wall. The ejected, from the wall, vorticity patches wrap around the tornado-like vortex causing its weakening. Behind the wall the tornado vortex is subjected to the turbulent flow that further disrupts the tornado vortex structure. The tornado-like vortex mitigation results in a low wind speed region behind the tornado-break wall, where the wind velocities are reduced by more than 50 %.

Developing a Wide-Angle Velocity Probe for Characterizing Tornado Wind Field

“…Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) has been utilized in several numerical studies of tornado structures, behaviours, and interactions with the built environment (Sarkar et al 2005;Kuai et al 2008;Natarjan and Hangan 2009;Gorecki and Selvam 2014;Kashefizadeh, Verma and Selvam 2019;Li et al 2020). Basically, CFD simulates fluid systems using mathematical modeling of the physical problem and numerical methods that can be solved using a computer (Zuo 2020).…”

“…There are other numerous published studies where CFD has been utilized to model tornadoes including Natarjan and Hangan (2009), and Gorecki and Selvam (2014).…”

“…The progress in numerical tornado simulation has been discussed in depth by Church et al (1993), andHonerkamp, Yan andSnyder (2020). Furthermore, there are other several studies where CFD was used to model tornadoes including Natarjan and Hangan (2009), Gorecki and Selvam (2014), and Li et al…”

Developing a Wide-Angle Velocity Probe for Characterizing Tornado Wind Field

“…The progress in numerical tornado simulation has been discussed in depth by Church et al (1993), andHonerkamp, Yan andSnyder (2020). Furthermore, there are other several studies where CFD was used to model tornadoes including Natarjan and Hangan (2009), Gorecki and Selvam (2014), and Li et al…”