A proposal to investigate the world-wide occurrence and distribution of thunderstorms by instrumented satellites
- Paper ID
IAF-66-060
- author
- company
Avco Corporation
- country
U.S.A.
- year
1966
- abstract
Today, one has available many sophisticated techniques, instruments, and carriers which can be used to determine accurately the number and spatial distribution of global thunderstorms at any given moment. The satellite, with its excellent global tracking and communication facilities, affords the scientists a unique opportunity to determine, with an accuracy much greater than BROOK’s1 figure of 1800, the number of global thunderstorms in progress at any moment. Not only the number, but the global distribution as well, can be determined “precisely”—within 10% or less instead of a factor of 2 to 3 as it is known today. The potential of the satellite for this purpose was recognized by the U.S. Weather Bureau as early as 1962.2 A new idea is not being proposed at this time, but rather an old one—according to today’s time-scale—accompanied by additional supporting arguments why it is important to know the number and the spatial distribution of global thunderstorms, and why and how the satellite can and will provide these data. The exact number and spatial distribution of global thunderstorms is essential, as ISRAËL3 and KASHMIR4 stated, to comprehend the total electrical characteristics of the stratosphere and mesosphere. In addition, it is also relevant to radio communication in terms of estimating the interference noise level, and to the general atmospheric circulation problem in meteorology.