17 O-excess in tropical cyclones reflects local rain re-evaporation more than moisture source conditions

Previous works focusing on O-17-excess in polar regions suggest that it primarily tracks moisture source relative humidity, but little is known about how to interpret O-17-excess data in lower latitudes. Here we present quasi-hourly triple oxygen isotope data of precipitation collected from two tropical cyclones in Texas and Louisiana in 2020 to understand the impacts of environmental and meteorological processes on the(17)O-excess of low-to mid-latitude precipitation.

We find that at both hourly time scales and the event scale,O-17-excess is strongly correlated to changes in on-site rainfall intensity and relative humidity, which is consistent with the theory that the isotopic fraction at ion associated with rain re-evaporation lowers the(17)O-excess of the remaining droplet. In addition, although evaporative conditions at the moisture source region may also influence( 17)O-excess of water vapor transported to the precipitation site, their impacts are likely over printed by the post-condensation rain re-evaporation processes.