Lightning Activity and Its Relationship with Typhoon Intensity and Vertical Wind Shear for Super Typhoon Haiyan (1330)

Super Typhoon Haiyan (1330), which occurred in 2013, is the most powerful typhoon during landfall in the meteorological record. In this study, the temporal and spatial distributions of lightning activity of Haiyan were analyzed by using the lightning data from the World Wide Lightning Location Network, typhoon intensity and position data from the China Meteorological Administration, and horizontal wind data from the ECMWF. Three distinct regions were identified in the spatial distribution of daily average lightning density, with the maxima in the inner core and the minima in the inner rainband. The lightning density in the intensifying stage of Haiyan was greater than that in its weakening stage. During the time when the typhoon intensity measured with maximum sustained wind speed was between 32.7 and 41.4 m s-1, the storm had the largest lightning density in the inner core, compared with other intensity stages. In contrast to earlier typhoon studies, the eyewall lightning burst out three times. The first two eyewall lightning outbreaks occurred during the period of rapid intensification and before the maximum intensity of the storm, suggesting that the eyewall lightning activity could be used to identify the change in tropical cyclone intensity. The flashes frequently occurred in the inner core, and in the outer rainbands with the black body temperature below 220 K. Combined with the ECMWF wind data, the influences of vertical wind shear (VWS) on the azimuthal distribution of flashes were also analyzed, showing that strong VWS produced downshear left asymmetry of lightning activity in the inner core and downshear right asymmetry in the rainbands.