AS DEPUTY director of the Japan Esperanto Society, it was clear what language Wasaburo Ooishi would choose to publish his discovery in. Unfortunately, it meant hardly anyone noticed.
In the mid-1920s Ooishi, a meteorologist in his day job, was releasing research balloons near Mount Fuji when he saw something odd. Once the balloons had climbed high into the atmosphere above the clouds, they suddenly hurtled out eastwards over the Pacific. Persistent high-level winds, often stronger than a hurricane, were blowing from west to east over Japan.
Other people had observed something similar in Europe, but Ooishi was the first to put two and two together and pinpoint the existence of a permanent, narrow tunnel of wind circling Earth at mid-latitudes, travelling at 100 to 400 kilometres per hour.
Gradually, knowledge of the jet stream circulated around the globe, too – albeit by unconventional means (see "Fu-Go no go"). Today, ...
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