Limit of Wind Speed on Planets: Factors and Upper Bound Explanation

[Justice Hunter]

Besides solar wind, what is the limit of a natural wind on planets? I know it's based on rotation and atmospheric pressure differences, but is there an upper limit to how fast wind can get on a planetary scale?

I would imagine that the speed of sound would justify a limit, but that doesn't make sense to me.

 

[phinds]

I remember reading that there are wind speeds in our solar system that are 5 times the speed of sound on Earth, so no, I'd say that's not a limit.

 

[davenn]

Solar wind is VERY fast ... at the time of typing this it is ...

Solar wind
speed: 369.9 km/sec

It can often exceed 1000 km/s with rare peaks to 3000km/s

do some googling on jet streams on Earth and wind speeds on Jupiter ... some respectable numbersDave

 

[phinds]

Oh, I was talking about winds on planets, since that's what the question was about.

 

[jim mcnamara]

How about expanding the scope - that gets us 200 million mph for an accretion disk for IGR J17091

http://chandra.harvard.edu/press/12_releases/press_022112.html

 

[rootone]

A good example of wind speed limitation here on Earth is that hurricanes and other cyclones always disintegrate rapidly when they encounter land masses.
A land mass cannot supply energy to the storm system to keep it going as a warm ocean does, and things like forests and mountain ranges are quite effective at draining away the energy which already is accumulated.

 

[Hornbein]

There is a limit on the angular velocity of any planets after which it would break up or become ovoid. That would limit the wind speed.

How about wind on a neutron star with equatorial velocity of c/10? Neutron stars have atmospheres of carbon gas. Though only a few inches thick, I don't see why there couldn't be wind.

The speed of sound would have nothing to do with it, since wind is molecules moving together, not oscillating.

 

[Justice Hunter]

Thanks for the responses everyone. After looking at some examples, there definitely doesn't appear to be a limit (other then the speed of light of course xd).