A lagrangian trajectory view on transport and mixing processes between the eye, eyewall, and environment using a high-resolution simulation of Hurricane Bonnie (1998)

The transport and mixing characteristics of a large sample of air parcels within a mature and vertically sheared hurricane vortex are examined. Data from a high-resolution (2-km horizontal grid spacing) numerical simulation of real-case Hurricane Bonnie (1998) are used to calculate Lagrangian trajectories of air parcels in various subdomains of the hurricane (namely, the eye, eyewall, and near environment) to study the degree of interaction (transport and mixing) between these subdomains. It is found that 1) there is transport and mixing from the low-level eye to the eyewall that carries air possessing relatively high values of equivalent potential temperature (theta(e)), which can enhance the efficiency of the hurricane heat engine; 2) a portion of the low-level inflow of the hurricane bypasses the eyewall to enter the eye, and this air both replaces the mass of the low-level eye and lingers for a sufficient time (order 1 h) to acquire enhanced entropy characteristics through interaction with the ocean beneath the eye; 3) air in the mid- to upper-level eye is exchanged with the eyewall such that more than half the air of the eye is exchanged in 5 h in this case of a sheared hurricane; and 4) that one-fifth of the mass in the eyewall at a height of 5 km has an origin in the mid- to upper-level environment where theta(e) is much less than in the eyewall, which ventilates the ensemble average eyewall theta(e) by about 1 K. Implications of these findings for the problem of hurricane intensity forecasting are briefly discussed.