Laboratory measurements have been made of the evaporation rate of fog when subjected to an intensity of 5 to 50 W/cm2 of 10.6-μ radiation. The measurements agree with calculations and show that most of the absorbed laser energy goes into heating the air by conduction from the droplet surface. This heated air induces a motion which prevents the laser from completely clearing the fog. A correlation is found which describes the visibility improvement as the fog and power density are varied.
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Mullaney et al. (1968) studied this question.