A new evaporation duct climatology over the South China Sea

The climatology of evaporation ducts is important for shipborne electromagnetic system design and application. The evaporation duct climatology that is currently used for such applications was developed in the mid 1980s; this study presents efforts to improve it over the South China Sea (SCS) by using a state-of-the-art evaporation duct model and an improved meteorology dataset. This new climatology provides better evaporation duct height (EDH) data over the SCS, at a higher resolution of 0.312°×0.313°. A comparison between the new climatology and the old one is performed. The monthly average EDH in the new climatology is between 10 and 12 m over the SCS, higher than that in the old climatology. The spatiotemporal characteristics of the evaporation duct over the SCS in different months are analyzed in detail, based on the new climatology.