On the quality of RS41 radiosonde descent data

Ingleby, Bruce; Motl, Martin; Marlton, Graeme; Edwards, David; Sommer, Michael; von Rohden, Christoph; Vömel, Holger; Jauhiainen, Hannu

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-15-165-2022

Articles | Volume 15, issue 1

https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-15-165-2022

© Author(s) 2022. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-15-165-2022

© Author(s) 2022. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 15, issue 1

Research article

|

11 Jan 2022

Research article |

| 11 Jan 2022

On the quality of RS41 radiosonde descent data

Bruce Ingleby, Martin Motl, Graeme Marlton, David Edwards, Michael Sommer, Christoph von Rohden, Holger Vömel, and Hannu Jauhiainen

Supplement

https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-15-165-2022-supplement

Data sets

Radiosonde descent data September-November 2019 B. Ingleby https://doi.org/10.5676/GRUAN/dpkg-2021-2

Model code and software

NCEPLIBS-buf NCEP/EMC Developers https://github.com/NOAA-EMC/NCEPLIBS-bufr

Short summary

Radiosonde descent data could provide extra profiles of the atmosphere for forecasting and other uses. Descent data from Vaisala RS41 radiosondes have been compared with the ascent profiles and with ECMWF short-range forecasts. The agreement is mostly good. The descent rate is very variable and high descent rates cause temperature biases, especially at upper levels. Ascent winds are affected by pendulum motion; on average, the descent winds are smoother.