A High‐Altitude Site Survey for SOFIA
A High‐Altitude Site Survey for SOFIA
复制标题
索菲亚高海拔现场勘察
DOI：
10.1086/316132
复制
发表时间：
1998
期刊：
影响因子：
--
通讯作者：
L. Pfister
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
M. Haas;L. Pfister
平流层红外天文台（索菲亚）是一架改装的波音747-SP，配备了一架2.5米望远镜，专门用于天文研究。目前由美国（NASA）和德国（DLR）联合研制，计划于2001年晚些时候开始运行。索菲亚执行其使命的能力将在很大程度上取决于其基地附近飞行高度及以上的气象条件。最重要的气象因素是高空云的频率和水蒸气超载的程度。本文通过收集最佳可用的气象数据，定义指标并对各种站点进行评估来进行高海拔站点调查。研究发现，这些指标证实了过去的空中经验，并与众所周知的全球环流模式、对流和对流层上层动力学一致。这些数据表明，索菲亚飞行高度的天气变化很大。特别是在夏季，美国大陆的一些地点被证明比夏威夷更糟糕，在那里，高海拔卷云和相关的水分历史上造成了美国宇航局柯伊伯机载天文台收集的天文数据的数量和质量的重大损失。索菲亚计划的基地，莫菲特场，加利福尼亚州，被发现有极好的高海拔天气，是美国大陆最好的网站之一。
The Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA) is a modified Boeing 747‐SP equipped with a 2.5 m telescope dedicated to astronomical research. Currently under joint development by the US (NASA) and Germany (DLR), it is scheduled to begin operations in late 2001. The ability of SOFIA to carry out its mission will depend strongly on the meteorological conditions at and above flight altitudes in the vicinity of its home base. The most important meteorological factors are the frequency of high‐altitude clouds and the magnitude of the water vapor overburdens. This paper performs a high‐altitude site survey by gathering together the best available meteorological data, defining metrics, and evaluating them for a variety of sites. These metrics are found to corroborate past airborne experience and to be consistent with well‐known global circulation patterns, convection, and upper tropospheric dynamics. They indicate that there are significant variations in the weather at SOFIA flight altitudes. Particularly in summer, some continental US sites are shown to be worse than Hawaii, where high‐altitude cirrus clouds and the associated moisture have historically caused significant losses in the amount and quality of the astronomical data collected by NASA's Kuiper Airborne Observatory. SOFIA's planned home base, Moffett Field, CA, is found to have excellent high‐altitude weather and to be one of the best continental US sites.