Analysis of Some “Project Jet Stream” Data

Abstract

Wind and temperature observations made by a specially equipped B-29 aircraft are compared with the conventional upper wind and temperature observations. Analyses of the two sets of data are compared in vertical and horizontal planes, and some wind field derivatives are compared and discussed. In one case strong vorticity fields of opposite sign are found to occupy ] the same region when computations are made from the two different sets of data. Two corrections to the wind speeds measured by pibal and rawin methods are discussed and applied to the data. These are the correction for the earth's curvature and a correction of the opposite sign which is caused by the graphical method of taking two minute* averages. It is suggested that perhaps the latter correction is large enough at low speeds to warrant applying it to upper wind data.