Using the Orthogonal Conditional Nonlinear Optimal Perturbations Approach to Address the Uncertainties of Tropical Cyclone Track Forecasts Generated by the WRF Model

Abstract The orthogonal conditional nonlinear optimal perturbations (O-CNOPs) approach for measuring initial uncertainties is applied to the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) Model to provide skillful forecasts of tropical cyclone (TC) tracks. The hindcasts for 10 TCs selected from 2005 to 2020 show that the ensembles generated by the O-CNOPs have a greater probability of capturing the true TC tracks, and the corresponding ensemble forecasts significantly outperform the forecasts made by the singular vectors, bred vectors, and random perturbations in terms of both deterministic and probabilistic skills. In particular, for two unusual TCs, Megi (2010) and Tembin (2012), the ensembles generated by the O-CNOPs successfully reproduce the sharp northward-turning track in the former and the counterclockwise loop track in the latter, while the ensembles generated by the other methods fail to do so. Moreover, additional attempts are performed on the real-time forecasts of TCs In-Fa (2021) and Hinnamnor (2022), and it is shown that O-CNOPs are very useful for improving the accuracy of real-time TC track forecasts. Therefore, O-CNOPs, together with the WRF Model, could provide a new platform for the ensemble forecasting of TC tracks with much higher skill.