Simulation of Heavy Precipitation and the Production of Graupel Related to the Passage of a Cold Front over the Australian Snowy Mountains

Abstract

The case study of a heavy precipitation event associated with the passage of cold front over the Australian Snowy Mountains (ASM) on 3 August 2018 has been examined using the observational data from an intensive field campaign and high-resolution (1 km) Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) simulation. We divided this event into prefrontal, cold front, and postfrontal periods. The cold front and postfrontal periods were characterized by higher production of graupel, while relatively low graupel was produced in the prefrontal period. Overall, aggregation along with deposition are likely the main growth mechanisms of snow in the prefrontal clouds, while heavy rain was produced below the melti..