Industrial emissions of ozone depleting substances (ODSs) during the second half of the twentieth century have led to one of the most visible human impacts on the Earth: the Antarctic ozone hole. The ozone loss intensified in the 1980s and reached the level of saturation (i.e., complete loss of ozone) due to the high levels of ODSs in the atmosphere. Significant changes in the southern hemispheric climate have been observed in the past decades due to this unprecedented ozone loss. Although the most recent studies suggest healing in the Antarctic ozone hole, the status of ozone in the loss saturation layer (~13–21 km) has not been discussed in detail. Here, a comprehensive analysis of vertical, spatial and temporal evolution of ozone loss saturation (ozone mixing ratio ≤ 0.1 ppmv) in the Antarctic vortex using high resolution measurements for the 1979–2017 period reveals that the loss saturation began in 1987 and continued to occur in all winters thereafter, except in the major warming winters of 1988 and 2002. However, our analysis shows a clear reduction in the frequency of occurrence of ozone loss saturation over the period 2001–2017 consistently throughout various datasets (e.g., ozonesonde and satellite measurements of ozone profiles and total columns), thereby revealing the emergence of an important milestone in ozone recovery.

在20世纪下半叶，工业消耗臭氧层物质（ODS）的排放已导致人类对地球最明显的影响之一：南极臭氧洞。由于大气中ODS的含量很高，在1980年代，臭氧的损失加剧，达到饱和水平（即，臭氧完全损失）。在过去的几十年中，由于这种前所未有的臭氧损失，南半球气候发生了重大变化。尽管最近的研究表明在南极臭氧洞中可以治愈，但尚未详细讨论损耗饱和层（约13-21 km）中臭氧的状态。这里，对臭氧损失饱和度（臭氧混合比≤0）的垂直，空间和时间演变进行了综合分析。