Trial of FastEddy Simulation of Building-Induced Airflow and the Comparison with LIDAR and Flight Data in an Operating Airport

The performance of FastEddy, a GPU-based large eddy simulation model, in simulating building-induced turbulent flow in an operating airport is studied for the first time through four examples, including a super typhoon case at Hong Kong International Airport (HKIA) and a real case of low-level wind effect. The simulation results are quantitatively compared with wind observations from Light Detection and Ranging (LIDAR) systems for selected cases, and with aircraft data and pilot reports in one example of low-level wind effect. The FastEddy model is found to perform reasonably well through these case studies, even for the radial component of the winds exceeding 20 m/s in a highly turbulent airflow simulation of a typhoon, as well as turbulent airflow features in a building complex at and around HKIA. The building-induced turbulent flow as observed by the LIDARs and the aircraft are largely reproduced. The scatter plots of the model-simulated and the observed Doppler velocities have good correlation in terms of the slope of the best-fit linear equation, correlation coefficient and root-mean-square difference. Moreover, for the case of low-level wind effect, FastEddy simulation is found to provide useful insight into the turbulent flow arising from the new terminal building over the northeastern part of HKIA (near 22.325° N 113.918° E) under construction. Further research directions for studying the performance of FastEddy are also discussed, such as considering more complex urban environments, comparison with in situ measurements of anemometers, and direct output of the eddy dissipation rate (EDR) from the model for comparing with LIDAR and anemometer-based measurements.