Vertical dispersion of contrails in the vortex regime is investigated by focusing on the role of entrainment and detrainment of exhaust with respect to the pair of trailing vortices. A ground-based backscatter-depolarization lidar with an integrated CCD camera provides information on optical and geometrical parameters of the contrail in the time span between 5.7 and 50.3 s behind a B747-400 aircraft. This is combined with coincident airborne in situ measurements of turbulence and the vertical profiles of temperature and wind speed in a case study. The two wingtip vortices, separated by 47 m, are descending with an increasing speed (2.5--3.1 m/s for 10.8--47.8 s behind aircraft) in the weakly nonstably-stratified atmosphere. The turbulent vertical dissipation rate on the day of the study above southern Germany is a factor of 1000 higher than found typically above oceans at cruising altitude. At 4.2 s behind the aircraft, a diffuse secondary wake starts to evolve above the two wingtip vortices. After ≈50 s the secondary wake encloses a cross-sectional area (4410 m2) comparable to that of the primary wake (4620 m2) and a relative ice surface area of 1:5. The observed early onset of the secondary wake is conjectured to be due to turbulent detrainment of fluid out of the primary wake which can be enhanced by detrainment due to baroclinic forces later in the vortex regime evolution. By exclusion of other mechanisms of secondary wake formation, detrainment of fluid from the primary wake is concluded to be the precondition for secondary wake formation. Detrainment due to baroclinic forces, shear or turbulence is, in general, unlikely to be absent for typical atmospheric conditions. It is suggested that the ambient humidity level may determine when a secondary wake is visible above a vortex pair and when it is not. ¿ 1999 American Geophysical Union