Global stratospheric net momentum flux and drag of gravity waves from
one year of radio occultations
Abstract
Gravity waves (GW) transport momentum flux (MF) and energy
across the lower, middle and upper atmosphere. Global Positioning System
(GPS)
radio occultation (RO) is one of the measuring techniques used onboard
satellites to provide vertical temperature profiles with global and
permanent
coverage. These retrievals may be applied in the study of GW. Some
usual
analysis methods provide absolute GWMF, but are missing its net
direction. This
happens because the procedures cannot deduce the propagation sense of GW
and
hence the direction of MF. We therefore recall here a recently presented
method
that allows the net calculation with four close in space and time RO
soundings
(quartets). We use about 10,000 daily retrievals from March 1, 2022 to
February
28, 2023 to study the seasonal and latitudinal global characteristics of
net
GWMF in the height interval from 20 to 35 km. About 600 quartets were
found.