Volume-imaging lidar observations of the convective structure surrounding the flight path of a flux-measuring aircraft

Journal Article · Mon Nov 30 04:00:00 EST 1992 · Journal of Geophysical Research; (United States)

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1029/92JD00878· OSTI ID:6035788

Eloranta, E W; Forrest, D K ^[1]

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1. Univ. of Wisconsin, Madison (United States)

This work is part of the First International Satellite Land Surface Climatology Project (ISLSCP) Field Experiment (FIFE), an international land-surface-atmosphere experiment aimed at improving the way climate models represent energy, water, heat, and carbon exchanges, and improving the utilization of satellite based remote sensing to monitor such parameters. Here the authors report on convective structure measurements in the atmospheric boundary layer (ABL) made from instrumented aircraft flights. To compensate for the limited spatial resolution of the aircraft flight path the data is correlated with simultaneous LIDAR measurements which provide a much larger scale picture of the atmosphere. Together these two diagnostics provide a much more informative picture of the ABL, especially in the vicinity of particular convective eddy structures. It becomes clear from this work that stable results require longer flight paths than the 15km legs in this sample area. Horizontal wind speeds from the two instruments agree very well.

• OSTI ID: 6035788
• Journal Information: Journal of Geophysical Research; (United States), Journal Name: Journal of Geophysical Research; (United States) Vol. 97:D17; ISSN JGREA2; ISSN 0148-0227
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
540110*
BOUNDARY LAYERS
CONVECTION
DISTRIBUTION
EARTH ATMOSPHERE
ENERGY TRANSFER
HEAT TRANSFER
LAYERS
MASS TRANSFER
MEASURING INSTRUMENTS
NATURAL CONVECTION
OPTICAL RADAR
RADAR
RANGE FINDERS
REMOTE SENSING
SPATIAL DISTRIBUTION
WIND