Abstract:
Tropical Cyclone (TC) Early Warning (EW) has benefited from recent improvements in storm-track forecasts derived from refinement in global Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP) systems using atmospheric initial data. Yet coastal populations threatened by tropical cyclones will increasingly need EW based, in addition, on forecasts of those intensity changes which may result from powerful air-sea interaction. Such needs, readily demonstrated from cases of grave intensification of TCs on passage over warm ocean areas shortly before landfall, may well be met relatively soon, now that appropriate ocean data in real time are becoming available – as initial data – for use in fully comprehensive programs where a modern NWP model is coupled to a fine-mesh multi-layer ocean model.