Observation and numerical simulation of a dust devil at the Hong Kong International Airport

Abstract

A dust devil was first observed in Hong Kong at the airport in 2021. This paper documents the meteorological conditions under which the dust devil occurred. The dust devil shows up nicely in the plan position indicator scans of a Doppler Light Detection And Ranging (LIDAR) system. The dust devil was found to be associated with a tiny vortex at the convergence line between the background northerly and the arrival of the easterly winds at the airport. The performance of a numerical weather prediction model in simulating the occurrence of the tiny vortex was also studied. In the large eddy simulation mode, the model reproduces nicely the tiny vortex associated with the dust devil. The results of this study are consistent with previous studies of dust devils in the literature, e.g. in the favourable conditions for its occurrence, the performance of large eddy simulation mode to reproduce the tiny vortices, etc.

Keywords

• dust devil
• lidar
• large eddy simulation