On the Relation between the Atmospheric Pressure in China and the Depth of Snow at Takata

Abstract

Takata is one of the localities noted for heavy snow fall. Using the 15 years, observations beginning with 1909, the author investigated the relation between the depth of the deepest snow at Takata and the monthly mean of the atmospheric pressure for each winter months from Oct. to March for the continental stations, Changchun in Manchuria, Tientsin near Peking, Hankow in Yang-tze Valley in the same winter. The correlation coefficients between both variates have been calculated and found to be small, indicating the relation between them is not conspicuous for the months Oct. to Dec. and Feb. to March. For the month January, however, the correlation coefficients are strikingly large as shown in the following table.
These results show that, the depth of the deepest snow at Takata is closely related, with the monthly mean pressure for January over the continent being closest with that over northern part i.e. Manchuria and rather less with that over southern part i.e. Yang-tze Valley.
This conclusion is apparently contradicted by the fact that, when a cyclone passed over the southern part of Japan Sea near the coast of Hokuroku, and consequently the pressure distribution becomes higher towards SW and lower towards NE, then at Takata and in its vicinity almost always a heavy snow-fall takes placc. But by the author's opinion, this is not true contradiction to the result obtained above, because in the latter case the monthly mean of the atmospheric pressure is treated and in the former case one concerns with a single current phenomenon.