Indication of convectively generated gravity waves observed by CLAES Original Research Article

Cryogenic Limb Array Etalon Spectrometer temperature data are analyzed for gravity waves (GWs) using the same methods previously employed for CRISTA data. We obtain nearly 1.5 years of continuous GW data between 34°S and 34°N and good coverage at higher latitudes depending on UARS yaw maneuvers. Correlations of GW variances with sea surface temperature indicate strong convective forcing above the Gulf of Mexico and the Kuro-Shio stream as well as above source regions in the southern subtropics during the summer months of the respective hemisphere. However, it appears difficult to clearly separate between convective forcing and the effects of the background winds, for which similar correlations are found. Further progress in accessing GW sources therefore can be expected mainly from improved measurements, which could provide also information about the GW horizontal wavelength as well as from quantitative comparisons to model predictions.