Field measurement and investigation of spatial coherence for near-surface strong winds in Southeast China

With aid of structural health monitoring systems, the field measurements have been proceeded in a ready manner in recent years. This treatment, however, raises a question on the influence of complex terrain associated with engineering structures upon coherence analysis. An independent field measurement is thus still necessary for the analysis of spatial coherence. In the present paper, the field measurement of near-surface strong winds in Southeast China is carried out. For implementing the purpose, an observation array was built up in a typhoon-prone area. The wind characteristics of local site, the spatial coherence of wind field and statistics of decay parameters in exponential formats are investigated. It is revealed that decay parameters of the Davenport and Krenk models have a different relationship to vertical and lateral separations, which are positively and weakly correlated to vertical separation, respectively; while both negatively correlated to lateral separation. The statistics of decay parameters relies significantly upon the time period of velocity readings. Besides, there is a logical relationship between decay parameters and wind velocity, maintaining a consistency with the pioneering measured data in 1960s-1970s.