Objective African Easterly Tracks in Reanalysis Data using "QTrack"

Objective track data for African Easterly Waves in reanalysis data (ERA5 and MERRA2) through 2024. Waves are tracked from June 1st through October 31st of each year. These tracks are produced using QTrack, following the method described in Lawton et al. (2022). Note that starting in 2024, tracks including both the ATL and EPAC basins will be included.

AEW Track data is updated on a yearly basis, typically in January of the following year. However, because the year 2024 uses preliminary HURDAT data to determine "developing" AEW classification, users are cautioned that these designiations could change pending finialization of the 2024 HURDAT year. 

Updated with Eastern Pacific Tracks: New easterly tracks have been produced through 2024 that included systems over the Eastern Pacific basin in addition to those over the Atlantic Ocean. These are stored as "ERA5_WITH_EPAC" and "MERRA2_WITH_EPAC". Please note that while the Atlantic Ocean tracks have been evaluated, the Eastern Pacific tracks have not. So use these data cautiously. 

If you use this data for your research, please cite:

Lawton, Q. A., S. J. Majumdar, K. Dotterer, C. Thorncroft, and C. J. Schreck, 2022: The Influence of Convectively Coupled Kelvin Waves on African Easterly Waves in a Wave-Following Framework. Monthly Weather Review, 150(8), 2055-2072, https://doi.org/10.1175/MWR-D-21-0321.1.

GitHub Repo for QTrack can be found here: https://github.com/qlawton/QTrack

Installable Python Module can be found here: https://pypi.org/project/qtrack/