Terrain blending with GFS

[afernandezody]

Hello,
I'm trying to set up a regional simulation but it's generating the error message.

----------------------------------------------------------------------
Beginning MPAS-init_atmosphere Error Log File for task 0 of 1
Opened at 2025/07/22 23:41:31
----------------------------------------------------------------------

ERROR: ********************************************************************************
ERROR: Error opening file with terrain field, GFS:2025-03-21_12
ERROR: ********************************************************************************
ERROR: *************************************************************
ERROR: Blending of terrain along domain boundaries would fail, and
ERROR: config_blend_bdy_terrain = true in the namelist.init_atmosphere file.
CRITICAL ERROR: *************************************************************
Logging complete. Closing file at 2025/07/22 23:41:31

It's like if there was an incompatibility with GFS.
Thanks

 

[mgduda]

Could you check (using the WPS rd_intermediate.exe utility, or though some other means) whether the GFS:2025-03-21_12 file contains a SOILHGT field? It's SOILHGT that is used for terrain blending, and if this field isn't present in the intermediate file, that could be one reason for the error you're seeing.

 

[afernandezody]

It actually seems to be there:

================================================
FIELD = SOILHGT
UNITS = m DESCRIPTION = Terrain field of source analysis
DATE = 2025-03-21_12:00:00 FCST = 0.000000
SOURCE = NCEP GFS Analysis GRID 3
LEVEL = 200100.000000
I,J DIMS = 360, 181
IPROJ = 0 PROJECTION = LAT LON
REF_X, REF_Y = 1.000000, 1.000000
REF_LAT, REF_LON = 90.000000, 0.000000
DLAT, DLON = -1.000000, 1.000000
EARTH_RADIUS = 6371.229492
DATA(1,1)=0.061863

 

[mgduda]

Apologies, I should have looked more closely at the error message you originally posted, and at the code where that message is generated: MPAS-Model/src/core_init_atmosphere/mpas_init_atm_cases.F at v8.3.1 · MPAS-Dev/MPAS-Model
It appears that the code is not able to successfully open the GFS:2025-03-21_12 intermediate file. What do you see if you run

ls -Ll GFS*

from the working directory where you're running the init_atmosphere_model program?

It could be worth trying to turn off terrain blending -- just as a test -- to see if the init_atmosphere_model program is able to successfully open the GFS:2025-03-21_12 file to read atmospheric fields.

 

[afernandezody]

Maybe I should be the one apologizing as the error message is now gone. I cannot know for sure which files were in which subdirectory yesterday; maybe maybe I just forgot to link them from the WPS subdirectory and ran the code thinking that the symlinks were there when they were not. At least I learnt about the SOILHGT field, which I had seen in notes but wasn't aware of its purpose. Thanks.

 

[mgduda]

No worries, and glad to hear that it's working now!