The interaction of counter-rotating strained vortex pairs with a third vortex

The vortex dynamics caused by the interaction of counter-rotating Burgers vortex pairs with a third Burgers vortex in a straining flow is investigated numerically. These interactions blend vortex merging and cancellation effects, and the aim is to investigate how the third vortex might influence the evolution of the vortex pair. Many different choices of initial conditions for the pair and third vortex exist, so attention is restricted to a class of initial conditions in which the vortex pair initially moves in the general direction of vortex 3, and the distance from vortex 3 to the line of free propagation of the vortex pair is the ‘offset’ parameter δ. A series of calculations with 0⩽δ⩽4 reveals three types of intermediate-time vortex dynamics that are called merging, swapping and switching. The evolution of the vortex core separation and core vorticity level diagnostics are used to determine the points of transition from merging to swapping and switching. In the longer term, vortex merging, cancellation and straining reduces the three vortices to a single vortex. Other diagnostics of interest are also monitored, including the spatial distributions of the rate of viscous dissipation and terms contributing to the vorticity transport equation. During the merging phase for the case with δ=0, double-peak and double-trough structures are observed in the dissipation-rate contours. In addition, the diffusion of vorticity dominates the vortex-stretching effect near vortex 1 during its absorbtion by vortex 3. Finally, the dynamics of the three vortices are also examined by computing a co-rotating angular velocity and stream function. A series of peaks in the co-rotating angular velocity is found to be associated with the conservation of angular momentum and interactions with a ‘ghost’ vortex in the co-rotating stream function.