2018-9-7, Dörnbrack, Andreas, Gisinger, Sonja, Kaifler, Natalie, Portele, Tanja Christina, Bramberger, Martina, Rapp, Markus, Gerding, Michael, Söder, Jens, Žagar, Nedjeljka, Jelić, Damjan

An exceptionally deep upper-air sounding launched from Kiruna airport (67.82∘ N, 20.33∘ E) on 30 January 2016 stimulated the current investigation of internal gravity waves excited during a minor sudden stratospheric warming (SSW) in the Arctic winter 2015/16. The analysis of the radiosonde profile revealed large kinetic and potential energies in the upper stratosphere without any simultaneous enhancement of upper tropospheric and lower stratospheric values. Upward-propagating inertia-gravity waves in the upper stratosphere and downward-propagating modes in the lower stratosphere indicated a region of gravity wave generation in the stratosphere. Two-dimensional wavelet analysis was applied to vertical time series of temperature fluctuations in order to determine the vertical propagation direction of the stratospheric gravity waves in 1-hourly high-resolution meteorological analyses and short-term forecasts. The separation of upward- and downward-propagating waves provided further evidence for a stratospheric source of gravity waves. The scale-dependent decomposition of the flow into a balanced component and inertia-gravity waves showed that coherent wave packets preferentially occurred at the inner edge of the Arctic polar vortex where a sub-vortex formed during the minor SSW.

2017, Schneider, Andreas, Wagner, Johannes, Söder, Jens, Gerding, Michael, Lübken, Franz-Josef

Measurements of turbulent energy dissipation rates obtained from wind fluctuations observed with the balloon-borne instrument LITOS (Leibniz-Institute Turbulence Observations in the Stratosphere) are combined with simulations with the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model to study the breakdown of waves into turbulence. One flight from Kiruna (68° N, 21° E) and two flights from Kühlungsborn (54° N, 12° E) are analysed. Dissipation rates are of the order of 0. 1 mW kg−1 (∼ 0.01 K d−1) in the troposphere and in the stratosphere below 15 km, increasing in distinct layers by about 2 orders of magnitude. For one flight covering the stratosphere up to ∼ 28 km, the measurement shows nearly no turbulence at all above 15 km. Another flight features a patch with highly increased dissipation directly below the tropopause, collocated with strong wind shear and wave filtering conditions. In general, small or even negative Richardson numbers are affirmed to be a sufficient condition for increased dissipation. Conversely, significant turbulence has also been observed in the lower stratosphere under stable conditions. Observed energy dissipation rates are related to wave patterns visible in the modelled vertical winds. In particular, the drop in turbulent fraction at 15 km mentioned above coincides with a drop in amplitude in the wave patterns visible in the WRF. This indicates wave saturation being visible in the LITOS turbulence data.