Assessing Hurricane Maria under Pseudo-Global Warming Using Model for Prediction Across Scales-Atmosphere (MPAS-A)

math_shortcuts As global mean surface temperatures increase, the characteristics of extreme weather events are projected to change, with important implications for tropical cyclone (TC) dynamics and thermodynamics. In this study, we assess the ability of the Model for Prediction Across Scales–Atmosphere (MPAS-A) to simulate a TC case relative to observations and under pseudo–global warming conditions. Hurricane Maria, a devastating Category 5 hurricane that impacted the Caribbean region in September 2017, is used as a case study to evaluate model performance under present-day (CTRL) and pseudo-global warming (PGW) scenarios. Our results show that MPAS-A captures the overall propagation direction of Hurricane Maria but underestimates its latitude prior to recurvature. Although the model does not reproduce the observed point-by-point storm track, it represents the large-scale environmental conditions governing TC evolution comparable to observations. Analysis of the North Atlantic Subtropical High (NASH) indicates that MPAS-A simulates a weaker NASH, which likely contributes to the equatorward bias in the simulated recurvature latitude. Under PGW conditions, Hurricane Maria follows a substantially different trajectory. Despite a shorter lifetime and more rapid intensification and decay, the PGW simulation produces a higher lifetime maximum precipitation than the CTRL case, highlighting the sensitivity of TC tracks, intensity evolution, and precipitation to a warming climate. Our analyses of the moist static energy budget show that latent heat changes contribute the most to differences in energy of Hurricane Maria under PGW.