Solar tides in the middle atmosphere. I: Description of satellite observations and comparison with theoretical calculations at equinox

In recent years several refinements have been made in the numerical computation of solar atmospheric tides between 30 and 60 km. Although comparisons have been made with winds observed by rockets it has not been possible until now to test these predictions against a globally extensive set of observations. In this paper we describe techniques for obtaining such observations from measurements made by the stratospheric sounding units (SSU) on the TIROS‐N series of satellites. These unique data are compared with calculations of the radiance variations expected from the SSU based on classical tidal theory at equinox.