THE COVARIABILITY BETWEEN ANOMALOUS NORTHEAST MONSOON RAINFALL IN MALAYSIA AND SEA SURFACE TEMPERATURE IN INDIAN-PACIFIC SECTOR: A SINGULAR VALUE DECOMPOSITION ANALYSIS APPROACH

The singular value decomposition technique (svd) is used to analyze the covariability between anomalous northeast monsoon (nem) rainfall in malaysia and the large-scale anomalous sea surface temperature (sst) in indian ocean, pacific ocean and seas surrounding the maritime continent. the svd analysis reveals two significant coupled modes of covariability with the first dominant mode explaining ~75% while the second coupled mode explaining ~15% of the total covariance. the first coupled mode highlights the covariability between anomalous nem rainfall in east malaysia and anomalous sst associated with the biennial oscillation type (bo-type) of the el nino-southern oscillation (enso). the second coupled mode highlights the covariability between anomalous nem rainfall in west malaysia and anomalous sst associated with the low frequency type (lf-type) of enso. overall, the bo-type and lf-type of enso define two distinct regimes of different behaviour of anomalous nem rainfall in malaysia east malaysia and west malaysia regions. during the bo-type of enso, east malaysia region is mostly affected while during the lf-type of enso, the impacts are mostly confined in west malaysia region