Stability analysis program

An attempt has been made to develop a new indicator of static stability which would be more highly correlated with convective activity than any of the commonly used stability indices, such as lifted index, K index, total-total index;, etc. All these indices are easy to compute, but all suffer from the same deficiency that only a few levels of the raob sounding are utilized. It is believed that a better indicator of stability should consider the complete vertical distribution of temperature and moisture. A simple computation is no longer important since a computer is now available. The technique proposed here examines the relative importance of energy areas on a thermodynamic diagram. The method consists of selecting a parcel of air in lowest 150mb of the atmosphere which has maximum instability (maximum wet bulb potential temperature), then computing the energy gained or lost by that parcel as it is raised to the upper levels of the atmosphere, while entraining environmental air during its ascent. This process utilizes all information available on the vertical structure of the atmosphere, and should provide a good measure of stability. The program was developed to run on an Eclipse S/230 minicomputer. Language used is Data General FORTRAN IV.