Evaluation and Application of Fengyun-4A/LMI Data in Tropical Cyclone Monitoring Over the Southeast Coast of China

摘要

Abstract Taking 8 tropical cyclones (TCs) in 2018 as examples, the data quality and the application potential of Fengyun-4?A (FY-4?A) Lightning Mapping Imager (LMI) in monitoring lightning activity and analyzing the relationship between lightning activity and TC intensity are investigated and evaluated over the southeast coast of China. A comparison shows that the diurnal variation and the radial spatial distribution of lightning activity from FY-4?A/LMI data, and the relationship between FY-4?A/LMI lightning activity and tropical cyclone (TC) intensity are mainly consistent with the existing ground-based observations. FY-4?A/LMI data are further utilized to analyze some issues that are controversial or contradictory in the existing studies, and results show that there are obvious differences in the spatial distribution of TC lightning between land and sea. When TC is located on the sea and the land, lightning activity presents a radial spatial distribution of high-low-high and low-medium-high, respectively. Higher lightning density is mainly concentrated in the west and south side of TC track. During the change of TC intensity, the lightning activity in the outer rainband continues to be active, but the lightning activity in the eyewall region may be a better indicator for the early warning of TC intensity. We conclude that FY-4?A/LMI has good performance and practical potential in TC lightning monitoring and early warning.