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Super Gravity Waves at Poker Flats Rocket Research Facility in Alaska

Huge Waves Detected in Atmosphere

Researchers have detected giant, fast-moving waves of air, caused by thunderstorms and other disturbances, above Poker Flat, Alaska, where a new radar is churning out the first three-dimensional images of upper atmospheric phenomena in the polar region.

"People have been envisioning doing this project for 40 years," said Eric Donovan, an associate professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Calgary in Alberta, Canada. "There's just a lot going on in this region that we don't understand."

The radar combines 4,096 small antennas, each with its own transmitter, on a single instrument, rather than one giant dish equipped with one powerful transmitter. Rather than physically rotating the radar to point in different directions, the steering is done electronically by slightly phasing each of the antenna elements differently.

Scientists have identified a few types of waves, some of which rip through the region of the atmosphere known as the mesopause, about 60 to 90 kilometers above the planet, and others in the thermosphere, roughly 200 to 300 kilometers in altitude.

The waves can be hundreds of kilometers long and travel at half the speed of sound.

http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2009/06/04/atmosphere-waves.html

Advanced Modular Incoherent Scatter Radar
www.amisr.com

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The cloud with no name: Meteorologists campaign to classify unique 'Asperatus' clouds seen across the world

Whipped into fantastical shapes, these clouds hang over the darkening landscape like the harbingers of a mighty storm.

But despite their stunning and frequent appearances, the formations have yet to be officially recognised with a name.

They have been seen all over Britain in different forms - from Snowdonia to the Scottish Highlands - and in other parts of the world such as New Zealand, but usually break up without producing a storm.

And some experts believe the stormy weather phenomenon deserves its very own classification.
Experts at the Royal Meteorological Society are now attempting to make it official by naming it 'Asperatus' after the Latin word for 'rough'.

If they are successful, it would be the first variety of cloud formation to be given a new label in over half a century.

'It is a bit like looking at the surface of a choppy sea from below,' said Gavin Pretor-Pinney, founder of the Cloud Appreciation Society, who identified the cloud from photographs sent in by members.

www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1189877/The-cloud-Meteorologis
ts-campaign-classify-unique-Asperatus-clouds-seen-world.html

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