Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-physics-of-atmospheres-and-oceans-course-of-the-university-of-oxford/2018/6/b/solution

Put and . Acting on the Fourier mode, . Continuity and horizontal momentum give and . The buoyancy equation gives . Substitution into vertical momentum yields
The two signs describe the two frequency branches; when the intrinsic frequency is required positive, . For a stationary disturbance , so . With this requires and selects the minus sign, . The stationary dispersion condition is
Differentiate the unconstrained dispersion before imposing stationarity. The stationary mountain-wave group velocity is obtained from the ground-frame dispersion; before imposing stationarity it is
On the stationary locus this becomes
Differentiating after substituting as though all neighbouring modes were stationary would incorrectly erase the frequency gradients.
For upward energy propagation from the lower boundary, choose , since and . It requires real nonzero , hence
The downstream ray inclination above horizontal is
It is fixed for a given monochromatic forcing, with the two signs of giving the upward/downward rays.
Frame qualification for the requested phase angle: the normal intrinsic phase velocity is . Because , the boxed stationary group velocity is exactly : its angle to intrinsic phase propagation is , and it is perpendicular to the stationary phase lines. By contrast the intrinsic group velocity satisfies , so its angle to intrinsic phase propagation is . In the ground frame the phase velocity of a strictly stationary pattern is zero and has no nonzero propagation direction. For example , gives and . These distinctions prevent applying the usual zero-flow perpendicularity rule to two velocities expressed in different frames.

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