Latitude-height cross-sections of the mean zonal geostropic flow at 500--0.4 mbar (about 5--55 km) were derived for individual months of the winters 1975--1976 to 1978--1979. VTPR radiation data from NOAA satellites were used to obtain data above radiosonde heights. These cross sections are supplemented by time-height cross sections at 65¿ N for 2-month periods of stratospheric warming activity in each winter. Our mean latitude-height cross section for winter shows marked differences from an earlier cross section published by Murgatroyd (1970), although some of the differences are due to the use of observed, rather than geostropic, winds in the latter. The cross sections for individual months show a strong dispersal, between 25¿ and 65¿ N, of the latitude of maximum wind in the lower mesospheric jet, which often appears as a split system, in contrast to a single jet in Murgatroyd's representation. The modulation of the zonal wind pattern from month to month and winter to winter is evidently related to the cross-tropopause propagation of planetary waves. The time-height cross sections for stratospheric warming periods show wind minima with apparent upward and downward propagation across the tropopause. The minima, which include cases of reversed zonal flow (easterly), are associated with high-latitude stratospheric warming and can be related further to the vertical propagation of planetary zonal height waves 1 and/or 2.