Identification

Title

In situ observations of supercooled liquid clouds over the Southern Ocean during the HIAPER Pole-to-Pole Observation campaigns

Abstract

Clouds over the Southern Ocean exist in a pristine environment that results in unique microphysical properties. However, in situ observations of these clouds are rare, and the dominant precipitation processes are unknown. Uncertainties in their life cycles and radiative properties make them interesting from a weather and climate perspective. Data from the standard cloud physics payload during the High-performance Instrumented Airborne Platform for Environmental Research (HIAPER) Pole-to-Pole Observations global transects provide a unique snapshot the nature of low-level clouds in the Southern Ocean. High quantities of supercooled liquid water (up to 0.47gm⁻³) were observed in clouds as cold as -22°C during two flights in different seasons and different meteorological conditions, supporting climatologies inferred from satellite observations. Cloud droplet concentrations were calculated from mean droplet size and liquid water concentrations, and were in the range of 30–120cm⁻³, which is fairly typical for the pristine Southern Ocean environment. Ice in nonprecipitating or lightly precipitating clouds was found to be rare, while drizzle drops with diameter greater than 100μm formed through warm rain processes were widespread. Large, pristine crystals were commonly seen in very low concentrations below cloud base.

Resource type

document

Resource locator

Unique resource identifier

code

http://n2t.net/ark:/85065/d7ns0vt2

codeSpace

Dataset language

eng

Spatial reference system

code identifying the spatial reference system

Classification of spatial data and services

Topic category

geoscientificInformation

Keywords

Keyword set

keyword value

Text

originating controlled vocabulary

title

Resource Type

reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2016-01-01T00:00:00Z

Geographic location

West bounding longitude

East bounding longitude

North bounding latitude

South bounding latitude

Temporal reference

Temporal extent

Begin position

End position

Dataset reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2013-10-16T00:00:00Z

Frequency of update

Quality and validity

Lineage

Conformity

Data format

name of format

version of format

Constraints related to access and use

Constraint set

Use constraints

Limitations on public access

None

Responsible organisations

Responsible party

contact position

OpenSky Support

organisation name

UCAR/NCAR - Library

full postal address

PO Box 3000

Boulder

80307-3000

email address

opensky@ucar.edu

web address

http://opensky.ucar.edu/

name: homepage

responsible party role

pointOfContact

Metadata on metadata

Metadata point of contact