First Advisor

Andrew Martin

Date of Award

6-16-2021

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelor of Science (B.S.) in Environmental Engineering and University Honors

Department

Civil and Environmental Engineering

Language

English

Subjects

Rain and rainfall -- Forecasting, Cyclones, Atmospheric science

DOI

10.15760/honors.1072

Abstract

Atmospheric rivers (ARs) play a crucial role in delivering precipitation worldwide. This makes them an important phenomenon for water resource specialists to study. One such interest is to understand what mechanisms make ARs produce significant rainfall and associated hazards such as flooding. One possible mechanism is that AR duration or intensity may increase when it interacts with a secondary cyclone, either of which can increase the AR category scale. The purpose of this study is to determine whether AR and secondary cyclone interactions increase the category scale ARs. Out of 52 AR events analyzed, 32 events contained at least one AR and secondary cyclone interaction. Of those 32 events, 25 events had persistent interactions. By conducting a paired t-test to compare the average AR scale at each monitoring station between events with and without persistent interactions, we found that secondary cyclones interactions did cause an increase in AR category scale. Moreover, we also found that events with secondary cyclone interactions produced more impacts measurable by the AR scale on the US West Coast.

Rights

In Copyright. URI: http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/ This Item is protected by copyright and/or related rights. You are free to use this Item in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. For other uses you need to obtain permission from the rights-holder(s).

Persistent Identifier

https://archives.pdx.edu/ds/psu/35695

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