Estimation of the Tropospheric Air Ratio near the Thermal Tropopause Using the Aircraft Measurements

V. I. Sitnikova, N. M. Sitnikov, A. E. Ulanovskii, G. N. Shur, A. N. Lukyanov, F. Ravegnani, and M. Mahoney

Results of the analysis of the stratospheric aircraft M-55 Geofizika measurements are presented. Estimates of the tropospheric air ratio near the thermal tropopause were conducted using the correlations between the water vapor and ozone values. The data of the measurements were used in the several aircraft campaigns held in the wintertime in the extratropical latitudes. The increased water vapor concentration was indicated during the flight on February 11, 2003 at the 12-km height which exceeds the averaged concentrations of water vapor in the extratropics by 1.5–2 times. The contribution of the tropospheric air near the thermal tropopause is quantitatively estimated. Results obtained here allow estimating the layer thickness in which the air masses of the different origin occur.