General trend of wind anomalies in the South EasternMediterranean Sea

Abstract EN

Air masses intrusion/replacement over any area or basin is the primary mechanism connecting atmospheric and oceanic characteristics through the transfer of heat, moisture and momentum at the sea surface.

Cyclic trends of hydrographic and air-temperature anomalies, as well as their relationship to the catch, in the south-eastern Mediterranean Sea have been previously concluded.

The three main wind components representing or controlling the air masses over the south-eastern Mediterranean are the Northwest (NW), the North-Northeast (NNE) and the South (S) components.

The present paper aims at drawing the possible long term wind trend over the south-eastern Mediterranean Sea.

The selected data set of wind vectors covers 35 years (January 1956 - December 1990) based on daily 3 hours records.

The general trend of the monthly variation in the monthly wind anomaly (MWA) is examined using the quadratic regression technique.

While the general trends for the NW and S monthly wind anomalies opposite that of hydrographic and air temperature anomalies over the same region, the trends of both the general and the NNE anomalies coincide with the behaviour of changes in the these anomalies.

The maximum NW and S anomalies occurred in 1967 and 2036, respectively.

The years of minimum occurrence for the general wind pattern and the NNE anomalies are 1979 and 1980, respectively.

Results of the present paper, assured by further analysis of marine surface meteorological data, declare the impact of the NNE wind component on the observed hydrographical and climatological behaviours over the south-eastern Mediterranean region.

This is assured through the analysis of occurrence frequency for the component taking a 33-years marine surface meteorological data set (1979-2011).