Soundings, Clouds, and Convection

Introduction

In a previous module, on soundings, you learned the basics of a sounding diagram: how to plot the temperature, pressure, and dew point of an air parcel, and how to determine how the temperature of the air parcel will change as it ascends or descends.

Besides using the sounding diagram as a worksheet, you can use it to plot all the data from a sounding, the observations taken by rawinsondes, instruments attached to weather balloons. This enables you to see the vertical temperature and moisture structure of the atmosphere, an ability which has many forecasting applications. Also, by "lifting" selected air parcels and comparing their characteristics to those of the environmental atmosphere, you can determine the possibility (and potential severity) of convection.

Learning Objectives

  1. To understand the dry and moist adiabatic lapse rates.
  2. To be able to read and interpret a sounding diagram.
  3. To be able to determine the change in temperature as air parcels rise or sink.
  4. To use sounding diagrams to assess the possibility of thunderstorms.

Table of Contents

  1. Sounding Data on a Sounding Diagram
  2. A Sample Sounding
  3. Changes From Day to Night
  4. A Second Pair of Soundings
  5. So You Want to Be an Air Parcel?
  6. Parcel Stability
  7. Superadiabatic Layers
  8. Convection
  9. Forecasting Convection
  10. Summary

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