This study analyzes the correlation between Western Pacific (WP) teleconnection pattern index (WPI) in April during 1954-2008 and rainfall amounts in the same month. Based on the results, it is identified that there have been strong positive correlations between central China, Korea and the southwestern part of Japan in the East Asian region. Through differences between 10 positive WP years and 10 negative WP years selected from the April WPI excluding ENSO years, it is found that rainfall amounts increase in April of positive WP years due to the following characteristics. Increases in rainfall amounts are evident in the East Asian middle latitudinal region where the positive correlation between the two variables is the highest and this is because anomalous southwesterlies are strengthened in the East Asian middle latitudinal region due to the spatial pattern of a south-low-north-high anomalous pressure system centered on this region that is made by anomalous anticyclones centered on the southeastern side of the region and other anomalous anticyclones centered on the northeastern side of the region. In addition, anomalous westerlies (jet) are strengthen in the upper troposphere of the East Asian middle latitudinal region and as a result, anomalous upward flows are strengthened in this region and thus anomalous warm air temperatures are formed in the entire level of the troposphere in the region. In addition to atmospheric environments, anomalous warm sea surface temperatures are formed in the seas in the East Asian middle latitudinal region to help the rainfall amount increases in the East Asian middle latitudinal region.

This study analyzed the climate regime shift using statistical change-point analysis on the time-series tropical cyclone (TC) frequency that affected Japan in July to September. The result showed that there was a significant change in 1995 and since then, it showed a trend of rapidly decreasing frequency. To determine the reason for this, differences between 1995 to 2012 (9512) period and 1978 to 1994 (7894) period were analayzed. First, regarding TC genesis, TCs during the 9512 period showed a characteristic of genesis from the southeast quadrant of the tropical and subtropical western North Pacific and TCs during the 7894 period showed their genesis from the northwest quadrant. Regarding a TC track, TCs in the 7894 period had a strong trend of moving from the far east sea of the Philippines via the East China Sea to the mid-latitude region in East Asia while TCs in the 9512 period showed a trend of moving from the Philippines toward the southern part of China westward. Thus, TC intensity in the 7894 period, which can absorb sufficient energy from the sea as they moved a long distance over the sea, was stronger than that of 9512. Large-scale environments were analyzed to determine the cause of such difference in TC activity occurred between two periods. During the 9512 period, anomalous cold and dry anticyclones were developed strongly in the East Asia continent. As a result, Korea and Japan were affected by the anomalous northerlies thereby preventing TCs in this period from moving toward the mid-latitude region in East Asia. Instead, anomalous easterlies (anomalous trade wind) were developed in the tropical western Pacific so that a high passage frequency from the Philippine to the south China region along the anomalous steering flows was revealed. The characteristics of the anomalous cold and dry anticyclone developed in the East Asia continent were also confirmed by the analysis of air temperature, relative humidity and sensible heat net flux showing that most regions in East Asia had negative values.

This study analyzed a correlation between South China Sea summer (June to September) monsoon (SCSSM) and the ENSO for the last 32 years (1979 to 2010). There was a correlation that the higher (lower) the SST in the Niño-3.4 region was, the weaker (stronger) the SCSSM intensity was. To identify the reason for this correlation, a difference of means between 8 El Niño years and 8 La Niña years (June to September). The analysis on the difference between two groups with respect to the 850 hPa stream flows showed that there were anomalous huge cyclones in the subtropical Pacific in the both hemispheres so that cold and dry anomalous northerlies were strengthened in the South China Sea relatively while anomalous westerlies were strengthened from the Maritime Continent to the off the coast of Chile. The analysis on the difference between two groups with respect to the 200 hPa stream flows showed that the opposite anomalous pressure system pattern to that in the 850 hPa stream flows were shown. In the subtropical Pacific of the both hemispheres, anomalous anticyclones existed so that anomalous easterlies were strengthened from the Maritime Continent to the equatorial central Pacific. Considering the anomalous atmospheric circulations in the upper and lower layers of the troposphere, upward airflows from the equatorial central and eastern Pacific were downward in the South China Sea and the Maritime Continent, which was a structure of anomalous atmospheric circulations. This means that the Walker Circulation was weakened and it was a typical structure of atmospheric circulations revealed in El Niño years.

This study is carried out in order to bridge the gap to understand the relationships between South Asian and East Asian monsoon systems by comparing the summer (June-September) precipitation of Nepal and South Korea. Summer monsoon precipitation data from Nepal and South Korea during 30 years (1981-2010) are used in this research to investigate the association. NCEP/NCAR reanalysis data are also used to see the nature of large scale phenomena. Statistical applications are used to analyze these data. The analyzed results show that summer monsoon precipitation is higher over Nepal (1513.98 ± 159.29 mm y-1) than that of South Korea (907.80 ± 204.71 mm y-1) and the wettest period in both the countries is July. However, the coefficient of variation shows that amplitude of interannual variation of summer monsoon over South Korea (22.55%) is larger in comparison to that of Nepal (10.52%). Summer monsoon precipitation of Nepal is found to be significantly correlated to that of South Korea with a correlation coefficient of 0.52 (99% confidence level). Large-scale circulations are studied to further investigate the relationship between the two countries. wind and specific humidity at 850 hPa show a strong westerly from Arabian Sea to BOB and from BOB, wind moves towards Nepal in a northwestward direction during the positive rainfall years. In case of East Asia, strong northward displacement of wind can be observed from Pacific to South Korea and strong anticyclone over the northwestern Pacific Ocean. However, during the negative rainfall years, in the South Asian region we can find weak westerly from the Arabian Sea to BOB, wind is blowing in a southerly direction from Nepal and Bangladesh to BOB.

In this study, instead of economic estimation of forecast value, we evaluated the value score(VS) of the user satisfaction using the concept of satisfaction/dissatisfaction. We compared the collective Value Scores (cVS) based on outputs of probabilistic forecasts of precipitation seasonally in Seoul and Busan during the period of 2004 to 2013 and ÿnally found the optimum threshold that can improve cVS of both cities. When using 30% threshold, the users can expect a higher cVS compared with those using other thresholds. When using the seasonal optimum threshold in Seoul, the cVS is additionally higher by 9%. These results show the level of satisfaction of the forecast that can be improved when the meteorological communities inform the users the correct threshold of the rainfall probabilistic forecast.

We found that, in 1984, there was a climate regime shift in April mean precipitation in Gwangju of Jeollanam-do province, Korea using a statistical change-point analysis. During the period of post-1984(1985-2013), the April mean precipitation in the years post-1984 showed a distinct decrease, compared to the pre-1984 period(1954-1984). This regime shift was also observed in China and Japan, excluding southern China. One of the major causes for the decreasing April mean precipitation during the recent three decades was the increased snow depth in the mid-latitude regions of continental East Asia. The increased snow depth resulted in strengthened cold and dry anticyclone anomaly over continental East Asia and a relatively weakened subtropical anticyclone anomaly over the western North Pacific. The anomalous synoptic conditious supported a continuation of the typical winter pressure pattern of ‘high-West and low-East’ over East Asia in April. The intensified northerly winds from this zonal pressure pattern anomaly played a significant role in restricting the northern movement of the subtropical anticyclone and there by preventing the inflow of warm and humid air into Korea.

This study provides the empirical results of the customers' necessity and intentions of purchasing weather index insurance using survey of asking the customers' recognition about weather insurance. In this article, we discovered that not only the customers' past experience of loss but also the extent of damage and the effects that change in weather would have on their firm are positively related to an intention to purchase weather index insurance. In addition, the level of premiums was significantly higher for the highly-intended group of willing to purchase weather index insurance than the comparison group.