Abstract:
From 13:00 to 16:00 on May 30, 2024, downslope-enhanced convective storms triggered destructive winds reaching 12 Beaufort scale in Beijing urban area, causing severe damage including toppled utility poles and large trees with diameter at breast height (DBH) exceeding 1 meter. This study combines damage surveys with polarimetric Doppler weather radar observations to investigate the disaster characteristics and physical processes of the severe winds. The results show that the damaging winds exhibited westward-divergent patterns, with extreme winds generated by microbursts and sub-100-meter-scale downburst tracks, reaching at least EF1 intensity and locally EF2 level. Observational analysis reveals that 1-2 hours before the storms moved downslope, enhanced low-level southwesterly winds and sustained convergence zones along the mountainous areas facilitated moisture accumulation in Beijing"s western foothills, with Global Positioning System observed Precipitable Water Vapor increases. The downslope movement of the storms essentially resulted from gust fronts interacting with mountain-foot convergence zones, triggering new convective storms that rapidly developed into a squall line with reflectivity exceeding 55 dBZ within 18 minutes. Physical process analysis indicates that the damaging winds in areas like Bei"anhe were caused by downbursts embedded within cold pool-driven gust fronts. The extreme winds near Yuanmingyuan additionally involved a low-level γ-mesoscale vortex, whose path closely matched the severely damaged areas, demonstrating the vortex"s direct impact on localized wind intensification. At 14:30, radar detected radial velocities reaching 53 m/s (at an altitude of 0.38 km) after velocity de?aliasing, along with features resembling tornadic debris, albeit with relatively weak echo intensity. Quantitative estimation of different physical processes suggests cold pool outflow contributed approximately 20 m/s, while the low-level γ-mesoscale vortex and downbursts each enhanced near?surface winds by 15-18 m/s.