Tropical Soil Moisture Estimation from Meteorological Observations.

Abstract

A climatology of soil moisture in the 6- to 12-in. layer beneath the surface of the earth is required for estimating the probability of favorable trafficability conditions. Insufficient measurements are available to prepare such a climatology. Therefore, this study was undertaken to determine the feasibility of estimating soil moisture from long records of meteorological observations, and then using the estimates to obtain the desired climatology. It was found that the meteorological observations contained insufficient information to accurately estimate day-to-day changes in soil moisture. However, they contained sufficient information to delineate the dry and wet seasons and to identify the periods and rates of transition from one season to the other. (Modified author abstract)

Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Feb 04, 1974
Accession Number
AD0778099

Entities

People

  • Iver A. Lund
  • Stanley M. Needleman

Organizations

  • Air Force Cambridge Research Laboratories

Tags

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Abstracts
  • Climatology
  • Measurement
  • Moisture
  • Observation
  • Probability
  • Trafficability
  • Transitions

Fields of Study

  • Environmental science

Readers

  • Computational Modeling and Simulation
  • Ocean-Atmosphere Mesoscale Modeling, Data Assimilation, and Flux Boundary Layers
  • Thermal Physics or Thermal Science.