TABLE OF CONTENTS The basic types of atmospheric effects on aviation were discussed in the preceding chapter. However, these effects seldom occur in isolation or in their pure form. Analysis of aircraft accidents shows most of them to occur because of a combination of circumstances. Meteorological factors may combine with nonmeteorological factors to cause accidents and incidents. Further, where meteorological factors are solely responsible for accidents, a number of such factors may be involved. Again, there may not be a one-to-one correspondence between atmospheric phenomena and the types of effect encountered by aircraft. Thus a single phenomenon may give rise to different types of effects on aircraft. More importantly, certain types of parent phenomena harbour a variety of subprocesses, each with its distinct effects on aviation. It is thus necessary to understand the major types of atmospheric phenomena of significance to aviation before proceeding to discuss the design aspects of the instruments and systems devised to detect and characterise them.
As mentioned before, aviation is much more sensitive to severe local phenomena and local variation of aviation-significant parameters than to large-scale or global climatic processes and trends which are of great significance in many branches of meteorology. The local phenomena may, of course, be driven by the overall climatic conditions. For example, the occurrence of a large low-pressure system over an area would give rise to myriads of thunderstorms. However, the type of instrumentation and modelling that provide information and forecasts about global and regional weather patterns do not provide details...
