Intercomparison of planetary‐scale diagnostics derived from separate satellite and radiosonde time‐mean temperature fields

The planetary‐scale components of the extratropical northern hemisphere troposphere‐stratosphere 1973–74 winter circulation are diagnosed using separate time‐mean temperature fields based on radiosonde and satellite observations. Meridional cross‐sections of zonal wind together with, for zonal wavenumbers 1, 2 and 3, the streamfunction amplitude, phase and Eliassen‐Palm flux are displayed, with the relative accuracy of the satellite‐derived diagnostics assessed through comparison with the ‘ground‐truth’ radiosonde information. The satellite and radiosonde diagnostics compare most favourably in terms of zonal wind speed and shear, direction of wave propagation and meridional wave structure—all of which are closely related to the differential properties of the atmospheric temperature field. The intensity of the satellite‐derived patterns of tropospheric wave propagation is underestimated due to the effects of spatial smoothing and residual cloud contamination present in the satellite radiance measurements.