Advancing atmospheric river science and inspiring future development of the Atmospheric River Reconnaissance Program – in the January 2024 issue of Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society

January 29, 2024

A new paper titled “Advancing atmospheric river science and inspiring future development of the Atmospheric River Reconnaissance Program” by David A. Lavers (ECMWF), Anna Wilson (CW3E), F. Martin Ralph (CW3E Director and AR Recon PI), Vijay Tallapragada (NOAA/NCEP, AR Recon Co-PI), Florian Pappenberger (ECMWF), Carolyn Reynolds (NRL), James D. Doyle (NRL), Luca Delle Monache (CW3E), Chris Davis (NCAR), Aneesh Subramanian (University of Colorado, Boulder), Ryan D. Torn (University at Albany), Jason M. Cordeira (CW3E), Luca Centurioni (SIO), and Jennifer S. Haase (SIO), was recently published in Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society. On June 27-29 2023, forty collaborators from research, operational, and academic centers met at the Atmospheric River Reconnaissance Workshop 2023 at ECMWF in Reading, UK. This paper summarizes the latest research, science questions raised, and future campaign plans presented at the AR Recon Workshop. Holding and reporting on this workshop contributes to CW3E’s 2019-2024 Strategic Plan Atmospheric River Research and Applications Priority Area, both by using AR Recon to further understand AR dynamics, and to enhance global AR monitoring.

Presentations, posters, and discussions were grouped under the following titles: (1) AR Recon in water year 2023; (2) Modeling, data assimilation, and impact studies; (3) Scientific advances in physical process understanding; and (4) the future of AR Recon. During the workshop, the multiple science questions were raised and suggested for further study, possibly through working groups. Topics included ways to refine and coordinate on impact studies with the various modeling centers, proposals for new verification metrics, exploring new sampling strategies, and leveraging new observational platforms (e.g., the NOAA G550 aircraft that will be available in coming years).

Recommendations for the future included the spatial expansion of observations to increase short and medium range forecast skill, more effective use of increased quantity and diversity of observations, and exchange of visiting scientists between institutions. The current AR Recon season began in November 2023 and the next AR Recon Workshop will be held in the fall of 2024.

The full meeting agenda, recording of each talk, copies of presentation slides, and posters presented at the meeting can be found here, on ECMWF’s website for the event.

Figure 1: Figure 2 from Lavers et al., 2024: A schematic showing the observing platforms currently used in the AR Recon program. This is an updated schematic that was first published in Zheng et al. (2021).

Lavers, D. A., Wilson, A. M., Ralph, F. M., Tallapragada, V., Pappenberger, F., Reynolds, C., Doyle, J. D., Monache, L. D., Davis, C., Subramanian, A., Torn, R. D., Cordeira, J. M., Centurioni, L., & Haase, J. S. (2024). Advancing atmospheric river science and inspiring future development of the Atmospheric River Reconnaissance Program. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, 105, E75-E83. https://doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-D-23-0278.1