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Tropical Cyclones (TCs) are devastating natural disasters. Analyzing four decades of global TC data, here we find that among all global TC-active basins, the South China Sea (SCS) stands out as particularly difficult ocean for TCs to intensify, despite favorable atmosphere and ocean conditions. Over the SCS, TC intensification rate and its probability for a rapid intensification (intensification by ≥ 15.4 m s−1 day−1) are only 1/2 and 1/3, respectively, of those for the rest of the world ocean. Originating from complex interplays between astronomic tides and the SCS topography, gigantic ocean internal tides interact with TC-generated oceanic near-inertial waves and induce a strong ocean cooling effect, suppressing the TC intensification. Inclusion of this interaction between internal tides and TC in operational weather prediction systems is expected to improve forecast of TC intensity in the SCS and in other regions where strong internal tides are present.

Author Posting. © American Geophysical Union, 2022. This article is posted here by permission of American Geophysical Union for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Geophysical Research Letters 49, (2022): e2021GL096530, https://doi.org/10.1029/2021gl096530., Water-mass transports in the vast and seemingly quiescent abyssal ocean, basically along topographically-guided pathways, play a pivotal role in the Earth's climate. The pulse of abyssal circulations can be taken with observations at topographic choke points. The Yap-Mariana Junction (YMJ) is the exclusive choke point through which the Lower Circumpolar Deep Water (LCDW) enters the Philippine Sea. Here, we quantify the LCDW transport and its variability based on mooring observations at the YMJ and the Mariana Trench (MT). The LCDW flows northward toward the Philippine Sea as an intensified current on the western side of the YMJ, with maximum mean velocity reaching 7.6 cm/s. The mean LCDW transports through the MT and the YMJ are 2.2 ± 1.0 Sv and 2.1 ± 0.4 Sv, respectively. Reversal flow at autumn in both the YMJ and MT is captured, indicating seasonal variability of the abyssal flow., This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant no. 91858203, 91958205, 42076027, 41676011), the National Key R&D Program of China (Grant no. 2018YFC0309800), the Global Change and Air–Sea Interaction Project (Grant no. GASI-IPOVAI-01-03, GASI-IPOVAI-01-02)., 2022-07-28

Typhoon Megi passed between two subsurface moorings in the northern South China Sea in October 2010 and the upper ocean thermal and dynamical response with strong internal tides present was examined in detail. The entire observed water column (60–360 m) was cooled due to strong Ekman-pumped upwelling (up to 50 m in the thermocline) by Megi, with maximum cooling of 4.2°C occurring in thermocline. A relatively weak (maximum amplitude of 0.4 m s−1) and quickly damped (e-folding time scale of 2 inertial periods) near-inertial oscillation (NIO) was observed in the mixed layer. Power spectrum and wavelet analyses both indicated an energy peak appearing at exactly the sum frequency fD1 (with maximum amplitude up to 0.2 m s−1) of NIO (f) and diurnal tide (D1), indicating enhanced nonlinear wave-wave interaction between f and D1 during and after typhoon. Numerical experiments suggested that energy transfer from NIO to fD1 via nonlinear interaction between f and D1 may have limited the growth and accelerated the damping of mixed layer NIO generated by Megi. The occurrence of fD1 had a high correlation with NIO; the vertical nonlinear momentum term, associated with the vertical shear of NIO and vertical velocity of D1 or vertical shear of D1 and vertical velocity of NIO, was more than 10 times larger than the horizontal terms and was responsible for forcing fD1. After Megi, surface-layer diurnal energy was enhanced by up to 100%, attributed to the combined effect of the increased surface-layer stratification and additional Megi-forced diurnal current.