arXiv subjects

Milton Gomez

Publications and source records attributed to Milton Gomez.

3 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

TCBench: A Benchmark for Tropical Cyclone Track and Intensity Forecasting at the Global Scale

TCBench is a benchmark for evaluating global, short to medium-range (1-5 days) forecasts of tropical cyclone (TC) track and intensity. To allow a fair and model-agnostic comparison, TCBench builds on the IBTrACS observational dataset and formulates TC forecasting as predicting the time evolution of an existing tropical system conditioned on its initial position and intensity. TCBench includes state-of-the-art physics-based (TIGGE) and Artificial Intelligence Weather Prediction (AIWP) models (AIFS, Pangu-Weather, FourCastNet v2, GenCast, FNV3). If not readily available (e.g., from the NOAA website as is done with TIGGE), TC tracks are consistently derived from model outputs using the TempestExtremes library. TCBench provides deterministic and probabilistic storm-following metrics. On 2023 test cases, AIWP models skillfully forecast TC tracks, while skillful intensity forecasts require additional steps such as post-processing or task-specific training. Designed for accessibility, TCBench helps AI practitioners tackle domain-relevant TC challenges and equips tropical meteorologists with data-driven tools and workflows to improve prediction and TC process understanding. By lowering barriers to reproducible, process-aware evaluation of extreme events, TCBench aims to democratize data-driven TC forecasting.

cs.CE↗

arXiv2025

Global Forecasting of Tropical Cyclone Intensity Using Neural Weather Models

Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP) models that integrate coupled physical equations forward in time are the traditional tools for simulating atmospheric processes and forecasting weather. With recent advancements in deep learning, AI-based Weather Prediction models that rely on neural network architectures$\unicode{x2013}$Neural Weather Models (NeWMs)$\unicode{x2013}$have emerged as competent medium-range NWP emulators, with performances that compare favorably to state-of-the-art NWP models. However, they are commonly trained on reanalyses with limited spatial resolution (e.g., 0.25{\deg} horizontal grid spacing), which smooths out key features of weather systems. For example, tropical cyclones (TCs)$\unicode{x2013}$among the most impactful weather events due to their devastating effects on human activities$\unicode{x2013}$are challenging to forecast, as extrema are smoothed in deterministic forecasts at 0.25{\deg} resolution. To address this, we use our best observational estimates of wind gusts and minimum sea level pressure to train a hierarchy of post-processing models on NeWM outputs. Applied to Pangu-Weather and FourCastNet v2, the post-processing models produce accurate and reliable forecasts of TC intensity up to five days ahead. Our post-processing algorithm is tracking-independent, preventing full misses, and we demonstrate that even linear models extract predictive information from NeWM outputs beyond what is encoded in their initial conditions. While spatial masking improves probabilistic forecast consistency, we do not find clear advantages of convolutional architectures over simple multilayer perceptrons for our NeWM post-processing purposes. Overall, by combining the efficiency of NeWMs with a lightweight, tracking-independent postprocessing framework, our approach improves the accessibility of global TC intensity forecasts, marking a step toward their democratization.

physics.comp-ph↗

arXiv2024

Lightning-Fast Convective Outlooks: Predicting Severe Convective Environments with Global AI-based Weather Models

Severe convective storms are among the most dangerous weather phenomena and accurate forecasts mitigate their impacts. The recently released suite of AI-based weather models produces medium-range forecasts within seconds, with a skill similar to state-of-the-art operational forecasts for variables on single levels. However, predicting severe thunderstorm environments requires accurate combinations of dynamic and thermodynamic variables and the vertical structure of the atmosphere. Advancing the assessment of AI-models towards process-based evaluations lays the foundation for hazard-driven applications. We assess the forecast skill of three top-performing AI-models for convective parameters at lead-times of up to 10 days against reanalysis and ECMWF's operational numerical weather prediction model IFS. In a case study and seasonal analyses, we see the best performance by GraphCast and Pangu-Weather: these models match or even exceed the performance of IFS for instability and shear. This opens opportunities for fast and inexpensive predictions of severe weather environments.

physics.ao-ph↗