How Can the International Monitoring System Infrasound Network Contribute to Gravity Wave Measurements?

Abstract

Gravity waves (GWs) propagate horizontally and vertically in the atmosphere. They transport energy and momentum, and therefore GWs can affect the atmospheric circulation at different altitude layers when dissipating. Thus knowledge about the occurrence of GWs is essential for Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP). However, uniform networks for covering GW measurements globally are rare, especially in the troposphere. It has been shown that an infrasound station of the International Monitoring System (IMS) infrasound network is capable of measuring GWs at the Earth’s surface. The IMS was deployed for monitoring the atmosphere to verify compliance with the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban-Treaty. In this study, the Progressive Multi-Channel Correlation Method (PMCC) is used for re-processing up to 20 years of IMS infrasound recordings in order to derive GW detections. For this purpose, two alternative PMCC configurations are discussed, covering GW frequencies equivalent to periods of between 5 min and 150 min. These detections mainly reflect sources of deep convection, particularly in the tropics. At mid-latitudes, coherent wind noise more often produces spurious detections. Combining the results of both configurations provides a global dataset of ground-based GW measurements, which enables the calculation of GW parameters. These can be used for improving NWP models.