#upper atmosphere

Lightning goes down.

Everyone knows that.

But look again.

The strike you see hitting the ground is only half of the event.

Above the storm, another discharge moves in the opposite direction.

It rises.

Not as a single bolt, but as bursts of energy reaching into the upper atmosphere — far above where clouds end.

Most people never see it.

Because from the ground, it’s almost invisible.

But from above — from aircraft, high-speed cameras, or space — the structure becomes clear.

Every storm is a two-way system.

One flow goes down. The other escapes upward.

Same lightning.

Two directions.

We’ve just been looking from the wrong place.

A view of the space shuttle Endeavor showing several layers of the atmosphere — the mesosphere (blue), the stratosphere (white), and the troposphere (orange). NASA

The upper atmosphere is cooling, prompting new climate concerns

Earth’s atmospheric layers. NOAA 

"The Earth’s atmosphere has a number of layers. The region we know best, because it is where our weather happens, is the troposphere. This dense blanket of air five to nine miles thick contains 80 percent of the mass of the atmosphere but only a small fraction of its volume. Above it are wide open spaces of progressively less dense air. The stratosphere, which ends around 30 miles up, is followed by the mesosphere, which extends to 50 miles, and then the thermosphere, which reaches more than 400 miles up.

From below, these distant zones appear as placid and pristine blue sky. But in fact, they are buffeted by high winds and huge tides of rising and descending air that occasionally invade our troposphere. And the concern is that this already dynamic environment could change again as it is infiltrated by CO2 and other human-made chemicals that mess with the temperature, density, and chemistry of the air aloft."

"Most of the satellites that have supplied information from the upper atmosphere over the past three decades — delivering his and others’ forecasts of cooling and contraction — are reaching the ends of their lives. Of six NASA satellites on the case, one failed in December, another was decommissioned in March, and three more are set to shut down soon. “There is as yet no new mission planned or in development,” he says.

Excerpt from this story from EcoWatch:

While increasing carbon emissions are heating Earth’s atmosphere near the planet’s surface, higher carbon dioxide levels are cooling the upper atmosphere. Scientists say this phenomenon could impact satellites and the ozone layer, and contribute to weather changes below.

A new study published in PNAS adds to the evidence of humanity’s fingerprint on climate change. While previous studies have tracked changes in the troposphere (where nearly all Earth’s weather happens) and lower stratosphere, the study noted that there was information lacking for the region 30 to 50 kilometers (approximately 18.6 to 31.1 miles) from Earth’s surface, or the mid to upper stratosphere.

Researchers finding temperature changes in the upper atmosphere means that humanity’s impact on climate is now five times more detectable. According to the study, is is now “virtually impossible for natural causes to explain satellite-measured trends in the thermal structure of the Earth’s atmosphere.”

The cooling trends in the upper atmosphere raise new concerns. The stratosphere and other outer layers of the atmosphere, like the mesosphere and the thermosphere, each have unique and harsh environments, with high winds and air that can quickly rise and fall within and beyond each layer. The concern now is that increasing carbon dioxide emissions can alter these patterns.

At Kakos Industries, we’re fond of saying “Every employee is expendable”, and if we start to say that often enough around the right people, things tend to get back on track. Also, we had to let a couple of people go. As far as I know, they are still floating somewhere in the upper atmosphere of Earth.