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 Next week’s BCCR seminar will be a given by Zheng-Hang Fu who is visiting the BCCR from Fudan University in China. He will talk about “Dynamic pathway linking Pakistan flooding to East Asian heatwaves”. 

 The seminar will take place in Bjerknes lecture room (4th floor, room 4020) on Monday March 24th at 11:00. For those not able to attend in person, it will be possible to join on zoom.

 Seminar abstract

In July to August 2022, Pakistan suffered historic flooding while record-breaking heatwaves swept southern China, causing severe socioeconomic impacts. Similar extreme events have frequently coincided between two regions during the past 44 years, but the underlying mechanisms remain unclear. Using observations and a suite of model experiments, here, we show that the upper-tropospheric divergent wind induced by convective heating over Pakistan excites a barotropic anomalous anticyclone over eastern China, which further leads to persistent heatwaves. Atmospheric model ensemble simulation indicates that this dynamic pathway linking Pakistan flooding and East Asian heatwaves is intrinsic to the climate system, largely independent of global sea surface temperature forcing. This dynamic connection is most active during July to August when convective variability is large over Pakistan and the associated divergent flow excites barotropic Rossby waves that propagate eastward along the upper troposphere westerly waveguide. This robust waveguide and the time delay offer hopes for improved subseasonal prediction of extreme events in East Asia.

Presenter information

Zheng-Hang is a second year Ph.D. student in the Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences at Fudan University. He earned his B.S. in Atmospheric Sciences from Fudan University in June 2023. His current research focuses on the dynamics of extreme climate/weather events, including heatwaves, fl