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System for determining potential location and severity of clear-air turbulence based on passive microwave sensor. Horn antenna for prototype clearair-turbulence warning system rotatable through plus or minus 45 degrees. Permits safer more comfortable flights for commercial airplanes and enables safer inflight refueling for military airplanes.
The avoidance of Clear Air Turbulence (CAT) is theoretically possible by selecting flight levels that are a safe distance from the tropopause and inversion layers. These favored sites for CAT generation can be located by an 'airborne microwave radiometer' (AMR) passive sensor system that measures altitude temperature profiles. A flight evaluation of the AMR sensor shows that most CAT could be avoided by following sensor-based advisories. Some limitations still exist for any hypothetical use of the sensor. The principal need is to augment the sensor's 'where' advisories to include useful 'when' forecasts.
Pulsed microwave radar backscattering used in model tests of clear air turbulence detection
An infrared radiometer system has been developed that can alert a pilot of an aircraft 2 to 9 minutes in advance of an encounter with clear air turbulence. The time between the warning and the clear air turbulence event varies with the flight altitude of the aircraft. In turbulence-free areas, the incidence of false alarms is found to be less than one in 3.4 hours of flight time compared to less than one per 10 hours of flight time in areas with turbulence.
Forecasting, detection, and alleviation of problems posed by flight in clear air turbulence
The nature and cause of clear-air turbulence is being investigated, in cooperation with the National Transportation Safety Board, using the flight records available from airline encounters with severe turbulence. This paper presents two case studies of severe turbulence which indicate that the airplanes involved encountered vortex arrays which were generated by destabilized wind-shear layers near the tropopause. In order to identify and analyze vortex patterns (i.e., vortex strength, size, and spacings), potential-flow models of vortex arrays were developed that describe reasonably well the wind patterns derived from the airliner flight records. The results of this analysis indicate that in the two cases studied, the vortex cores had diameters in the range of 900 to 1,200 ft with tangential velocities in the range of 70 to 85 ft/sec. This study presents the first identification and analysis of vortex arrays from airline flight data. The results are compared with theoretical predictions and previous observations.
Clear air turbulence and refractivity variations, and radar detection systems - bibliography with abstracts
Fluid mechanics study of instabilities in atmospheric flow systems associated with clear air turbulence
Relationship between atmospheric temperature gradients and clear air turbulence of lower atmosphere
A system to be employed by an aircraft for the detection of clear air turbulence is described. The system employs a laser light beam which is directed ahead of the aircraft along the flight path. The portion of the light reflected back to the aircraft by atmospheric aerosol is detected and analyzed for Doppler shift. The velocity and intensity of the turbulence is determined by the type and amount of the light reflected.
Analyses of the mounting and mount support systems of the clear air turbulence transmitters verify that satisfactory shock and vibration isolation are attained. The mount support structure conforms to flight crash safety requirements with high margins of safety. Restraint cables reinforce the mounts in the critical loaded forward direction limiting maximum forward system deflection to 1 1/4 inches.
The results of four case studies of clear air turbulence (CAT) using the diagnostic Richardson number tendency (DRT) formulation are highlighted. The performance of this technique in resolving regions of documented CAT encounters is encouraging. Its operational adaptability appears particularly attractive in that input data can be supplied by the currently operational rawinsonde system. Two CAT indices are calculated deterministically, sensing synoptic scale changes in static stability and vertical wind shear conductive for supporting mesoscale CAT layers. These two indices reveal volumes of the troposphere which act as source regions for patches of CAT. The first, the time to reach the critical Richardson number necessary for the initiation of turbulent conditions, was first used by Oard (1974). A second index is devised which is an adaptation of Roach's (1970) work relating synoptic scale and mesoscale energetical coupling and gives more information on the relative intensity of these source regions. The output from the DRT computer module highlights specific regions of the atmosphere which can be interpreted operationally in terms of a CAT encounter probability.
The results of several case studies of Clear Air Turbulence (CAT) using the Diagnostic Richardson Number Tendency (DRT) formulation are highlighted. The performance of this technique in resolving regions of documented CAT encounters is encouraging. Its operational adaptability seems particularly attractive in that the input data can be supplied by the currently operational Rawinsonde system. A CAT index is calculated deterministically, sensing synoptic-scale changes in static stability and vertical wind shear conducive for supporting meso-scale CAT layers. This index reveals volumes of the troposphere which act as 'source regions' of Kelvin-Helmholtz instabilities. The results suggest that these regions are particularly efficient with respect to the synoptic/meso-scale energetical coupling necessary for supporting significantly turbulent layers. The output highlights specific regions of the atmosphere which can be interpreted operationally in terms of CAT-encounter probabilities.
Factors influencing the accuracy of the forecasts of incidences of clear air turbulence (CAT) are discussed, along with techniques for improved verification. Descriptive ranking terms for the intensity of CAT events, ranging from light to extreme, are developed, and meteorological parameters used for predictions are reviewed, including jetstream core location, vertical and horizontal wind shears, stable layers, tropopause height, trough speed, 500-mb vorticity, surface fronts, pressure centers and cyclogenesis, and wind speeds near mountain ridges. Methods of remote detection of CAT, particularly by using radiometry sensitive to the IR water vapor band, are noted to have had some success in detecting actual CAT events and decreasing false alarms. Statistical aspects of CAT encounter severity are discussed, including the establishment of confidence intervals for thresholds of detection of CATs of varying intensities.
Mixing coefficients due to clear-air turbulence are estimated from turbulence observations from aircraft, and from large-scale dissipation estimates from the large-scale energy budgets. Maximum coefficients occur near middle-latitude jet streams, and eddy viscosity there is of order of 10 sq m/sec; eddy conductivity is estimated to be about ten times smaller. These coefficients are introduced into the 12-layer general circulation model of the National Center of Atmospheric Research. They produce an apparently significant, though small reduction in maximum speed of the jet, and a reduction in eddy energy. Further, the stratospheric polar-night jet is produced at about the correct location with about the correct intensity.
The basic reference material for gust design criteria are cited. The status of clear air turbulence meteorology (forecasting and detection) is discussed. The directions of further research technology is indicated.
A vortex model of winds associated with clear-air turbulence (CAT) is shown to be useful for characterizing actual airline CAT encounters. The model consists of an array of vortices with solid-body cores embedded in a potential flow field. Parameters such as the size and strength of the vortices and their locations are identified using a modified Newton-Raphson algorithm. A manual identification start-up scheme is used to minimize errors in the initial parameter estimates, and the identification algorithm is found to be robust in regard to the remaining errors. The analysis of a CAT encounter involving a commercial airliner demonstrates the success of the model and estimation procedure. The analysis finds vortices with core diameters of 1000 ft and tangential velocities of 87 ft/sec in this encounter.
A method is disclosed for determining Richardson Number, Ri, or its reciprocal, RRi, for clear air prediction using measured potential temperature and determining the vertical gradient of potential temperature, d(theta)/dz. Wind vector from the aircraft instrumentation versus potential temperature, dW/D(theta), is determined and multiplies by d(theta)/dz to obtain dW/dz. Richardson number or its reciprocal is then determined from the relationship Ri = K(d theta)/dz divided by (dW/dz squared) for use in detecting a trend toward a threshold value for the purpose of predicting clear air turbulence. Other equations for this basic relationship are disclosed together with the combination of other atmospheric observables using multiple regression techniques.