Dear Authors,

You have carefully revised the manuscript. However, clarifications for
some points are still needed. Please find the REFEREE #2 report below
and prepare your manuscript accordingly before you submit this.

Many thanks and Best regards
Jayan

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REFEREE # 2 report







The manuscript "Evolution of the eastward shift in the
quasi-stationary minimum of the Antarctic total ozone column" by
A. Grytsai et. al. compare the development of several atmospheric
variables with the Ozone column the central variable.

General:

Compared to the first version of the manuscript the authors clarified
the study and included an extensive part comparing their results to
the model Australian Community Climate and Earth System Simulator
(ACCESS-CCM). Still I am a bit at loss of what to make of the
study. More exact, I see a list of features which all need further
investigation, because many feature bring up the question how the
ozone recovery will take place and how the effects on mid latitude,
i.e. Australia and New Zealand will be.


Sometimes it looks like the authors used a shotgun, fired in the bush
and collected what has been hit. As I wrote in the first review, I
think it is of importance and validity to hunt for features which need
explaining and study. However, it should not stop here, but go on. The
publication looks like a list of problems I would present to a PhD
student to choose from and start investigating.

The authors removed several strong statements which I criticized in
the first version as not being backup up by the analysis.
However, I sometimes have the impression, that the authors are scarred by their
own statements and back down immediately.

An example (but not the only instance):
page 6 line 195ff sounds a bit trivial to me:
(less Ozone -> less heating -> weaker polar jet -> change in wave propagation)
also papers are cited which find exactly this.
But the authors say "it MAY impact wave propagation" and in the next sentence:
"POSSIBLE couplings ... ."

In the end, in the conclusion it is finally cast in certainty. I have
to admit, I find this style difficult to follow, but accept that this
is a matter of taste.

In summary, I would recommend the publication of the study and hope
that the authors follow their own in work in more depth and study if
the connections suggested by the correlations really exist and what
they mean in detail.

In detail:

The authors still did not define what they mean be a 'composite'. On
page 8 line 264 they write composite (average). Do they mean a
composite is just an average over the three month S, O, N? Also, I
still dont undestand the concept of an anomaly composit. Is it an
average over several anomalies? If so, also over S, O, N?

The paragraph page 8, line 264 ff is rather confusing. It took me a
while to understand this. I think one of the sentences is superfluous,
because both seem to state the same thing with different words.

page 6 line 177 Do the authors mean, that r=0.39 would already be significant?

page 7 line 212/13 Wording: Two sentences start with 'We then ... '

A sentence like line 252 ...variability ... with high probability
... could ... does not sound as if the authors are convinced by there
own study. It is another example of what I wrote before, that the
authors sometimes seem afraid of their own findings.

line 256 - 259 Is this in contradiction to (Mo and Higgins, 1998)?

page 9 line 313 Do the authors mean, the the surface pressure
anomalies cause the variance of the OSW_min longitudinal variance?

page 10 line 222 ... show likely ... in connection with line 325
... could mean ... makes a very weak statement: An assumption which
may be true leads probably to a cause.

The authors have considered the referee suggestions and now it is ready for a publication.