Despite advice from forecasters, it appears that an official storm warning was not issued by the Zimbabwean government until after ex-Eline had already impacted the eastern regions of the country. Contour interval for (b) and (c) is 0.5°C and shaded areas denote positive anomalies. These events can be chronicled from the 2000 Cyclone Eline that caused 91 Atmos. This rainfall was about 70% of the average February precipitation total. Prog. Meteor. A significant gap exists between Pietersburg and the next station to the north, Harare (18.3°S, 31.1°E), where at most one sounding per day is made, depending on resources. 7) stretching northwest–southeast across southern Africa. For financially constrained agencies in southern Africa, developing simple CLIPER-type models (such as those in use in Mauritius) that incorporate regional and ENSO conditions available on the Internet may be more feasible. It has been argued that large-scale precursor synoptic conditions (strong ridge south of the Mozambique Channel, preceding trough over southern Africa, and an easterly steering current at midlevels) promoted the track of Eline. Each time, the disasters have left deaths and significant damage to infrastructure in their wake. After Eline began restrengthening and turned more to th… 0000035209 00000 n Developing improved forecasting in southern Africa is hampered by a lack of human and financial resources, limiting or, in many cases, precluding radiosonde and surface measurements as well as running NWP and other dynamical models. D. J. Karoly and D. G. Vincent, Eds., Amer. Climate, 16 , 3932–3945. (c) SST anomalies for Feb 2000. 5). In February 2000, Cyclone Eline hit central Mozambique after weeks of flooding, and their combined effects killed around 700 people and caused an estimated $500 million (USD) in damage. 1) and then strengthened further to intense tropical cyclone status on 22 February over the western margins of the channel just prior to landfall. Corresponding author address: Dr. Chris Reason, Dept. 0000030678 00000 n } 0000007011 00000 n 0000026199 00000 n 8b), and southern Namibia was relatively dry. Note that UKMO statistics are computed over the full ocean track of the storm (4–23 February) whereas the La Réunion results are only for 8–21 February (24-h forecast) or 8–19 February (48-h forecast). Local forecasters should be aware of the precursor synoptic conditions for TC landfall, the previous few months' rainfall, and the current state of the vegetation (and by inference, soil moisture), as well as regional SST anomalies, the orientation of the 28°C isotherm, and ENSO phase. About 25–40 mm fell over southeastern Namibia on 1 March as the convective activity began to shift eastward with the westerly migration of the cloud band and the subsequent ridging of the next South Atlantic anticyclone behind the front. A scale vector of 200 g kg− 1 m s−1 is shown. After crossing the 2000–2500-m-high Chimanimani Mountains in eastern Zimbabwe, ex-Eline weakened from moderate tropical storm to tropical depression status. These operational centers reported that the forecasts generally had a left-of-observed-track and fast bias. Figure 8 shows moisture fluxes and associated convergence at 850 hPa for the 3 pentads (5-day average) up to and including the significant rainfall event of 29 February. The Eta model horizontal resolution is a uniform 0.5°, so it does not capture local vegetation gradients between the Kruger National Park (savanna) and neighboring farms (mainly fruit, sugar, and cattle) and pine or eucalyptus plantations, or orographic details. Less known is that ex-Eline tracked about 2000 km across southern Africa toward the Atlantic (Fig. February–March 2000 saw devastating floods in Mozambique, Zimbabwe, and South Africa. (2003) show that La Niña conditions may increase the risk of TC landfall in Mozambique by enhancing the westward steering flow and that this risk is increased further if local SST anomalies are warm. Third, easterly winds at 500 hPa of about 10 m s−1 associated with the northern half of the ridge occurred in the southern Mozambique Channel and neighboring SWIO, and acted as a steering current toward and across southern Africa during 14– 28 February (Fig. RSMC La Réunion, 2002: La Réunion Tropical Cyclone Centre. NCEP reanalyses indicate that most of central and western southern Africa had significant positive soil moisture anomalies in December 1999, and these wetter soil conditions intensified further in January 2000. This La Niña induced very wet conditions over southern Africa prior to the event, leading to favorable soil moisture and land surface conditions for westward penetration of Eline and ongoing convection. 0000003773 00000 n These scores indicate the improvements available from the UKMO NWP model, particularly with increasing lead time. The heavy rainfall and floods over the northeastern Interior of South Africa during February 2000. At 0400 UTC 29 February, the SAWB issued a heavy rain warning for central and southeast Namibia, timely given that this was the wettest day of the entire summer. 9), favoring local intensification and landfall of tropical systems. Unfortunately, since TCs rarely penetrate inland, such alertness would have been unlikely in most southern African forecast offices. This warning remained in effect until the morning of 15 February. 1991; Jury and Pathack 1991). 9b,c) where the composite displays cool anomalies. The large-scale influences on the highly unusual track of Eline are considered in section 3, including that of SWIO sea surface temperature (SST) via Reynolds optimally interpolated (OI) (Reynolds and Smith 1994) and Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) (Kummerow et al. At least 172 deaths have been reported and 327 people are reportedly missing in Zimbabwe (OCHA, 27 March 2019). These areas included the track of ex-TC Eline across southern Africa, implying that the precursor surface conditions over the land were considerably moister than average. background: #193B7D; Information brochure, Météo France, La Réunion, 12 pp. In February 2000, only Irene did two ascents per day (0000 and 1200 UTC), while only the 0000 UTC ascent was done at Pietersburg. 1 as well as information about local forecasts and observations during Eline. 0000003460 00000 n The NCEP/NCAR 40-Year Reanalysis Project. During 24–27 February, the storm moved over northeastern Botswana toward Namibia (Figs. Six hours prior to landfall, Eline became an intense tropical cyclone just 45 km from the Mozambique coast. Track of Eline across the south Indian Ocean and southern African mainland with its position marked at 0400 and 1600 LT during the 3 Feb–1 Mar 2000 period. 1) and contributed significantly to the semidesert region of southern Namibia having its wettest summer since 1976 and the third wettest of the last 50 years. padding: 0; 0000015934 00000 n Natl. Although Eline occurred farther south (17°–18°S), these plots indicate (not shown) that over 8°–12°S, 50°–70°E, the thermocline was indeed deeper than the model climatology during January and early February 2000. The cyclone affected the eastern and … As a result of Eline and a tropical depression in early February, this region received very heavy rainfall with flooding. Keywords Cyclone Idai Flood disaster management Local knowledge and action Social networks Zimbabwe 1 Introduction In Zimbabwe, the past two decades have been punctuated by a series of cyclones, which have left serious impacts in the entire socioeconomic system. ZIMBABWE is reportedly set to experience another tropical cyclone that will result in massive flooding, especially in Manicaland province. A local maximum of relative vorticity at 850 hPa is used to identify the center of the TC in the model with a surface fitting technique to locate it accurately. The model only simulated over 200 mm in a very small area in the low-lying region near the Mozambique border, and the model-predicted region of heavy rainfall did not extend far enough west into northern South Africa. A summary of the accuracy of La Réunion and Met Office forecasts of Tropical Cyclone Eline over the Indian Ocean is given. During El Niño, TC tracks tend to concentrate in the 50°–70°E band just east of Madagascar since the high pressure anomalies centered over the eastern Indian/ Australasian sector are unfavorable for TCs farther east. 4b–e, 6). 8c) corresponds to the second major wet spell of the summer over southern Namibia, including its wettest day (29 February), and shows some similarities in moisture flux with pentad 1 over the mainland. It resulted in loss of life, damage to homes, fields, schools and roads, and disruption to livelihoods. Section 2 uses National Centers for Environmental Prediction–National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCEP–NCAR) reanalyses (Kalnay et al. Note that Fig. The importance of this steering flow for enhancing the risk of SWIO TC making landfall on Mozambique is consistent with climatology and AGCM experiments (Vitart et al. 8a) looks similar over southern Africa to the summer climatology except that there was enhanced convergence over northern Namibia–southeastern Angola. Given that La Niña state and regional circulation, SST, and rainfall anomalies are available in near real time over the internet, local forecasters across the region could have been in a heightened state of alertness by January 2000. This tropical trough evolved ahead of a cold front approaching the far southwest coast from the South Atlantic, and these two systems formed a tropical–extratropical cloud band on 29 February and 1 March (Fig. There are only four sounding stations along the roughly 3000 km of coastline in South Africa (Alexander Bay, Cape Town, Port Elizabeth, and Durban), and these now provide soundings only every 24 h instead of every 12 h. 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