Four days before Typhoon Ragasa’s rainbands hit Taiwan, the 3.75-km MPAS predicted >36" of rain in the mountains—while the 15-km parallel run only showed up to 24".

By better resolving Taiwan’s terrain and upslope rainfall, the high-res run shows the value of higher resolution in complex terrain.

Four days before Typhoon Ragasa’s rainbands hit Taiwan, the 3.75-km MPAS predicted >36" of rain in the mountains—while the 15-km parallel run only showed up to 24".

By better resolving Taiwan’s terrain and upslope rainfall, the high-res run shows the value of higher resolution in complex terrain.

18-Sep 00Z MPAS forecast has a major typhoon aiming at the Luzon Strait in three days. This system hasn't even formed yet, so we'll see.
👉 project.mmm.ucar.edu/real-time-fo... Variable: Infrared Brightness Temp, Domain: Invest 90 (WP90)

While a Mesoscale Convective System did form this evening over the Colorado plains (left), the MPAS forecast had it farther north than observed (right)

Today's #MPAS forecast has two cyclones in the eastern Pacific that appear to be locked in a Fujiwara-like fashion.
👉 project.mmm.ucar.edu/real-time-fo...
variable: 10-m Winds, domain: EPAC (zoom), forecast hour 120

One advantage of high-resolution global models is their ability to resolve topography and its influence on weather. In this 5-day accumulated rainfall forecast for Puerto Rico, the model predicts little to no rain along the southern coast but more than 200 mm (8 inches) in the northwestern interior.

The downslope flow drove temperatures into the mid to upper 60s (~18C) on the eastern slopes with little humidity. There’s still some snow cover over Colorado the high plains, which creates some local cold patches.

Down near the surface, there was a lee trough east of the front range, which helped to drive downslope flow.

In the upper levels, there’s a ridge over Colorado, westerly flow, and an upstream a trough over the Pacific. This set up brings in some upper level moisture which often produced wave clouds, which we had today (though the clouds broke over Boulder).