Meaning

Doldrums is a belt of low pressure girdling earth at the equator, where warm and moist air/winds from the latitudes above and below the equator merges. There are various other names used for this zone, the most famous one being ITCZ (= Inter Tropical Convergence Zone). There is much variety in the weather in the doldrums, which is characterized by long periods of calm wind alternated by heavy rains, thunderstorms and stormy weather. In the past, when there were only sailing ships, the long periods of calm wind were feared, because the shortage of fresh food on board often lead to scorbutic. Also characteristic for the weather in the doldrums are the so-called “cloud clusters”, which are large coherent and high banks of clouds with large horizontal stretch. A beautiful example of this is shown on the satellite photo (source: wikipedia.org).