# Tag Info

## Hot answers tagged vorticity

14

The equation of motion for a fluid parcel in the atmosphere (in Cartesian space) is $$\dfrac{D\mathbf u}{Dt} = -\dfrac{1}{\rho}\nabla p-2 \mathbf \Omega \times \mathbf u + \mathbf g + \mathbf F,$$ where $\mathbf u$ is the wind, $\rho$ is density, $p$ is pressure, $\mathbf\Omega$ is the angular velocity of the Earth, $\mathbf g$ is gravity and $\mathbf F$ ...

11

There are two key intermittent mid latitude circulation patterns during boreal winter. One is blocking flows, leading to the formation of blocking anticyclones. One can gauge the location of blocking events through the CPC blocking index. The other one is sudden stratospheric warming, where the winds cause a disturbance such that the temperature in the ...

9

Tornadoes, land/waterspouts and supercell thunderstorm mesocyclones are examples of vortices where Coriolis is unimportant. Tornadoes are in cyclostrophic balance. Land and waterspouts (as well as non-supercell tornadoes) arise from horizontal convergence of vertical vorticity. The supercell mesocyclone spin originates as horizontal vorticity that is ...

5

I am not not an expert in meteorology, but do study the chemistry involved in these types of events. My understanding is that the folds in the tropopause generally occur below the front of the jet stream, when the potential vorticity is strong enough to transport stratospheric air down through the tropopause/inversion. Please see the relevant quote from Q....

2

It is more of a consistency argument: if a constant-depth ocean with much less relative vorticity than planetary vorticity is to stay that way, the flow must be zonal. If there were significant meridional velocities, they would cause significant meridional displacements of water masses, which would then, by conservation of angular momentum, no longer have ...

2

Based on an answer from ECMWF support which OP can confirm to my best understanding relative vorticity in the ECMWF model is not calculated using grid points and finite differences (centered and forward and backward). Instead it is calculated using spectral approaches in meteorology. There is a package in Fortran called spherepack and a python wrapper as ...

1

This one has not been answered for a long time and I am going to summarize what I wrote in the comments. If I understood OP's question correctly I believe it is asking why Potential Vorticity is not shown in weather maps in a operational sense. From this old(but still very useful reference) Isentropic Potential Vorticity presuming isentropic surface are ...

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