A generalized beta‐advection model to improve unusual typhoon track prediction by decomposing total flow into climatic and anomalous flows

Abstract

Abstract Using a novel approach of decomposing total flow into climatic and anomalous flows, we have developed a generalized beta‐advection model to improve unusual typhoon track prediction within 2–3 days. Typhoon Megi (2010) that experienced an unusual path is first used to introduce this model. Differing from the conventional beta‐advection model (BAM) in (i) decomposing the total flow into the climatic and anomalous flows and considering their interaction and (ii) taking the layer of minimum divergence anomaly and maximum vorticity anomaly instead of any average layers done by, for example, the shallow BAM, the medium BAM, and the deep BAM, this model is a combination of the climatic‐flow BAM and the anomalous‐flow BAM. In this paper, 19 cases of sudden right‐turning typhoon and 10 cases of straight‐moving typhoon in the South China Sea are studied to examine this model's capability. Results show that 15 right‐turning and 10 straight‐moving cases were successfully predicted by this combination model.