Four turbulence measurement campaigns were performed in the winter sub-tropical jet streams of south coastal Japan and Australia during 1998-2001 with the objective to capture the dynamics of severe refractive and clear air turbulence events. The aircraft used was the GROB 520T EGRETT, which is owned and operated by Airborne Research Australia a unit of Flinders University of South Australia. Severe turbulence events are difficult to forecast and measure but are of critical importance to commercial air safety (NASA-FAA) and the High Energy Laser (HEL) propagation disturbances. Measurements have shown that weak turbulence/severe turbulence events are associated with anisotropy/isotropy of the turbulent velocity spectra/structure parameters. Strong turbulence events are associated with Froude number that are near unity; weak turbulence with Froude numbers £ 1. The role that fluctuating velocity-pressure gradient correlation in maintaining strong turbulence and the limited success of Richardson number and other diagnostics as a predictor will be discussed.