Image processed to show land outlines and grid
Northern hemisphere ozone receives little attention.
Fairly recently a partial view of the north has become available, still incomplete, model output, nevertheless this might be eye opening.
The images used here are from NASA [1] are tilted partial northern hemisphere. Image left here is making the geography clear, barely makes the Mediterranean, southern US or Japan.
Fingers of ozone reaching far south has been known for a long time, pre-dates satellites, is rarely mentioned.
Satellite sensing is restricted by how it has to be done: the only proper way is by transmission through the atmosphere, which means from the ground. Reason: measurement uses the difference in absorption between a pair of spectral lines where a light source shining through, daytime the sun, night-time reflected sunlight, the moon, hence remote sensing has no data night side.
(for more on ozone measurement see http://daedalearth.wordpress.com/2013/07/13/stratospheric-ozone-dobson-history-at-oxford/)
Below are clickable thumbnails which will download a small (mostly smaller than 2.5MB) MP4 file from NASA for local playing on your computer. You need player software.
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These are MP4 videos on a NASA server, larger than the above thumbnails. All are incomplete years, mostly Nov 1st through 31st May. Daily frames at 6fps.
The resemblance to electrical ionisation patterns is not a coincidence and these rotate, the earth view does not. You are viewing the earth slightly tilted with Greenland more or less where you are looking, see head image. Higher resolution versions are on the NASA site. MOV format might be available.
I have a video of all the above. This has missing segments which I could insert as blank. This is 80MB which is too large as a sensible blog file and anyway seen part, seen most of it.
1. Data is from
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Goddard Space Flight Center
Arctic Ozone Watch
http://ozonewatch.gsfc.nasa.gov/NH.html
A warning about the website, you will be thrown to Antarctic at every opportunity or pointed at partial data. For example link, only longer animations linked are for a single month “December 1979–2013”, beware.
I’ve yanked out a common set of information and that is the basis of this blog post.
Post copied from my own blog as likely of some interest to Talkshop readers.
Posted by Tim
Tallbloke's Talkshop 
The sideways “w” (bottom panel) isn’t random:
I doubt ozone is entirely a random matter, deliberately didn’t give an opinion.
What is going on over the south pole doesn’t interest me much, the rest does because so little is made clear in public or even known, that’s pretty clear from plenty of sources.
Do you have any thoughts on what is causing what is found or how it interlinks with other things?
We have a strong magnetic storm. Cosmic rays low.
Ozone, 17 km.
The temperature quickly decreases at a height of about 20 km – 25 km.
Pressure at a height of 20 km.
You can see a clear shift in the highest decrease of ozone in northerly direction Atlantic, from Greenland to Scandinavia.
It is important that in the layer where the ionization is much less ozone image changes completely.
The decrease in the radiation is visible in the measurement of neutrons. I recall, at what height is the highest ionization.
I’ve been trying to flick through some of the reference papers to try to understand why the northern regions should be fundamentally different to the South Pole in terms of physical/environmental difficulties encountered. With little joy. Optics is not my strong point.
http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/atmosphere/publications/1997AOring.pdf is cited as being a key reference for establishment of a solar Fraunhofer calibration reference spectrum.
Cloud and ice make for extra difficulties in measurement, but following why
http://www.knmi.nl/omi/documents/publications/2006-05_Applied_Optics_OMI_wavelength_Voors.pdf works for cloud, I have not grasped yet, and will probably take too long.
You’ve been busy and found good indications things are immensely complex.
So far as I know ground measurements are the master but spatial coverage is very poor. Dobson instruments continue in use.
Magnetic polarity is another variable. Interactions every which way yet over 100 years ago Angstrom mentioned high Ozone radiation during part of the year in Scandinavia. We still seem to be far from really understanding.
What I also wondered was that in a region of such high albedo wrt insolation, if snow/ice/clouds have such a large impact on the spectroscopic measurement of ozone, might they not also have a significant impact on the effects of ozone?
Dependence ozone from the solar wind is obvious.http://oi42.tinypic.com/v5lmiu.jpg
The pressure at the height of 45 km (1 hPa).
Amount of ozone at the same height.http://oi41.tinypic.com/2j47ij6.jpg
From the above graphic shows that already at such a high altitudes ozone is reduced during winter unevenly. That is, the UV does not have significant. There must be another external factor.
You have to remember that in the winter polar vortex in the stratosphere is achieved enormous speed and wind in the troposphere is driven by the jet streams in the stratosphere.
Lock in the stratosphere may completely change the circulation in the troposphere.
This is seen currently in North America.
Air density is very low so fast movement high up carries little energy. Air lower down is relatively like treacle.
Important is the energy due to the high temperature gradient in the stratosphere.
For example, the air above the water causes the water vortex.
Look at the cross-section and consider how the troposphere can cause the lock at the height of 45 km?
300 hPa level is the level of the tropopause on the border of the stratosphere. Look also temperature distribution.
If you look at the animation of the previous winter, you will see that the lock is already visible on November 29, in the same location as this year.
[video src="http://ozonewatch.gsfc.nasa.gov/ozone_maps/movies/OZONE_D2012-11-01%25P1D_G%5E360X240.MMERRA_LNH.mp4" /]
Lock level of 500 hPa is the result of blockages in the stratosphere. The animation can be seen the flow of air all over atmosphere.
You see, as warm air enters the Polar Circle because of blocking polar vortex.
This is the model of the polar vortex.http://oi39.tinypic.com/t62vkg.jpg
The animation that shows the blocking the stratosphere at 20 km.
We can see that the temperature in the vortex
center decreases with the increase of height and reaches its minimum at ńe levels 30-50 hPa (20-25 km).
The temperature gradients at the vońex edges increase with height in the stratosphere starting from the level
150 hPa, their maximum being observęd at the levels 50-10 hPa (20-30 km). In the troposphere temperahrre
gradierrts are maximal neax surface corresponding to Arctic fronts separating ths AIctic air from warmer air
of middle latitudes, Thus, the vortex is most pronounced at the 50-30 hPa levels where the minimum of
stratospheric temperatures and the maximum of temperature gradients at its edges are observed. We can see
that the highest values of ion production rate due to GCR are observęd in the lower part of the vortex (10-15
km) where temperature gradients start increasing. On the other hand, the ll-year modulation of GCR fluxes
is sfoongest at the heights 20-25 km [Bazilevskaya et a1., 2008] where the vortęx is most pronounced. Hence,
the vortex location seetns to be favorable for the męchanis ns of solar activĘ influence on the atmosphere
circulation involving GCR variations. It is also favorable for the mechanisms involving solar UV variations,
as at these heights (15-25lon) in the polar stratosphere the maximum ozone content is observed.
The evolution of the vortex is known to be determined by dynamic coupling betweerr the troposphere
and stratosphere via planetary wave propagation, as well as by radiation processes in the stratosphere.
A new NASA report on Antarctica ozone finds the wind plays a part in ozone levels.
‘Results showed that in 2011, there was less ozone destruction than in 2006 because the winds transported less ozone to the Antarctic – so there was less ozone to lose. This was a meteorological, not chemical effect. In contrast, wind blew more ozone to the Antarctic in 2006 and thus there was more ozone destruction.’
http://phys.org/news/2013-12-nasa-reveals-results-ozone-hole.html
In the northern hemisphere ozone hole is currently very visible at a height of between 20 and 30 km.
