Analysis of a Lower-Tropospheric Gravity Wave Train Using Direct and Remote Sensing Measurement Systems

Abstract

On 10 August 2014, a gravity wave complex generated by convective outflow propagated across much of Oklahoma. The four-dimensional evolution of the wave complex was analyzed using a synthesis of near-surface and vertical observations from the Oklahoma Mesonet and Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Southern Great Plains networks. Two Atmospheric Emitted Radiance Interferometers (AERI)—one located at the ARM SGP central facility in Lamont, Oklahoma, and the other in Norman, Oklahoma—were used in concert with a Doppler wind lidar (DWL) in Norman to determine the vertical characteristics of the wave complex. Hydraulic theory was applied to the AERI-derived observations to corroborate the observationally derived wave characteristics. It was determined that a bore-soliton wave packet initially formed when a density current interacted with a nocturnal surface-based inversion and eventually propagated independently as the density current became diffuse. The soliton propagated within an elevated inversion, which was likely induced by ascending air at the leading edge of the bore head. Bore and density current characteristics derived from the observations agreed with hydraulic theory estimates to within a relative difference of 15%. While the AERI did not accurately resolve the postbore elevated inversion, an error propagation analysis suggested that uncertainties in the AERI and DWL observations had a negligible influence on the findings of this study.