TIDAL WIND FIELDS IN THE ATMOSPHERE

Abstract

After evaluation of the surface wind system associated with the stationary wave, the total tidal wind field on the surface is developed from the total semidiurnal pressure oscillation. Two major criticisms of the linear theory are studied and are shown to be unfounded. It is shown that the effect of the earth's magnetic field can certainly be neglected up to the E region. It is shown that even at 125 kilometers the viscous terms are some ten million times smaller than the retained linear terms. The 100-km tidal wind field is developed from the surface tidal wind field and some deductions from the linear theory of Taylor and Pekeris. The ionospheric wind observations near 100 km reported in the literature are discussed, and are shown to be in general agreement with the computed tidal winds.