Turbulence in the Free Atmosphere

Turbulence-the randomly disordered movement of volumes of air of widely varying size-is one of the characteristic features of atmospheric air flows; its investigation is essential for the solution of several theoretical and practical problems. Until recently, owing to experimental difficulties, research on turbu- lence was confmed mainly to the lower half of the troposphere. Theoretical investigations have consequently been based on these data. The rapid development of high-altitude aviation and cases of aircraft encoun- tering hazardous turbulence led to a sharp intensification of research on turbu- lence in the atmosphere up to 10-12 km, and subsequently at greater altitudes. Such research was confined initially to the characterization of the frequency of occurrence of gusts of different speeds, their relation to altitude, geographical conditions, time of day and year, and so on. At the end of the fifties, when the required measuring equipment and experimental techniques had been developed, it became possible to investigate the complete statistical characteristics of turbu- lence: the spectral densities of the velocity fluctuations of air flows, structure functions, etc. These data stimulated the further development of theory related to the specific conditions of the free atmosphere.