Geography 103: Weather

Exercise 6. A 1000 - 500 mb thickness chart.

The map below shows the thickness of the layer of the atmosphere between 1000 and 500 mb for January 13, 2004. This is the vertical distance through the atmosphere from the height where the pressure is 1000 mb to the height where it is 500 mb. This was printed from the web site http://weather.unisys.com. Go to this site to find instructions for reading and interpreting this.

Please use the data sheet to answer the questions following.

Where are the thicknesses greatest - at the top (north) or the bottom (south)?

What are the values of the labeled contours? (i.e. What thickness contours are labeled?) Do not include local Highs and Lows.

What units are these thicknesses in?

Every other contour in thickness is labeled. Judging from these values what do you think the separation of adjacent contours is? (Give units.)

Looking back at some of your earlier charts for this same day do large thicknesses correspond to warm or cold temperatures?

There is a local Low in the NE corner of Nevada, what is the thickness here?

Would you expect this low to correspond to locally high or low temperatures in the lower atmosphere here?

There is a local High in the western part of Montana. What is the thickness there?

Would you expect this high to correspond to locally high or low temperatures in the lower atmosphere here?