Temperature Deviations in the Midlatitude Mesosphere During Stratospheric Warmings as Measured with Rayleigh-Scatter Lidar

Abstract

While mesospheric temperature anomalies associated with Sudden Stratospheric Warmings (SSWs) have been observed extensively in the polar regions, observations of these anomalies at midlatitudes are sparse. The original Rayleigh-scatter lidar that operated at the Atmospheric Lidar Observatory (ALO; 41.7°N, 111.8°W) in the Center for Atmospheric and Space Sciences (CASS) on the campus of Utah State University (USU) collected an extensive set of temperature data for 11 years in the 45–90 km altitude range. This work focuses on the extensive Rayleigh lidar observations made during six major SSW events that occurred between 1993 and 2004, providing a climatological study of the midlatitude mesospheric temperatures during these SSW events. An overall disturbance pattern was observed in the mesospheric temperatures during these SSWs. It included coolings in the upper mesosphere, comparable to those seen in the polar regions during SSW events, and warmings in the lower mesosphere.