The Storm Peak Lab Cloud Property Validation Experiment: description and early results
Authors
Chuck N. Long (deceased) — NOAA- Earth System Research Laboratory
Gerald Mace — University of Utah
Roger Marchand — University of Washington
Matthew Shupe — University of Colorado
Paul Lawson — SPEC, Inc.
Ian B. McCubbin — Desert Research Institute
Gannet Hallar — University of Utah
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Linnea Avallone — National Science Foundation
Category
Cloud Properties
Description
Location of the AMF2 Thunderhead site during STORMVEX. The AMF2 van is located to the right and slightly below the Lodge. Picture taken from the face of Storm Peak just below the Storm Peak Lab.
From November 2010 through April 2011, the second ARM Mobile Facility (AMF2) was deployed to Steamboat Springs, Colorado, USA, to collect routine remote sensing data while aerosol and cloud property data were collected by mountain-top probes operated by the Storm Peak Laboratory (SPL) and by the University of Wyoming King Air research aircraft. The ground-based instruments included a scanning W-band radar (SWACR) and the new high spectral resolution lidar. The AMF2 instruments were deployed at various locations on the mountain ranging from the valley floor to just 400 m below the SPL laboratory elevation. The late autumn and early winter of 2010/11 (December–January as of this writing) provided nearly continuous cloud cover and frequent, almost daily, precipitation events that ranged from blizzards with intense upslope wind to light snow and even liquid-phase drizzle in light wind. Conditions at SPL ranged from thick liquid cloud with heavy snowfall to liquid clouds with no measureable precipitation to light snowfall with no measureable liquid cloud. In short, both remote and in situ sensors measured an extremely wide range of conditions over a period of time spanning many months. Early science is focusing on the degree to which cloud and precipitation signals can be extracted from the vertically pointing W-band radar spectra and the extent to which cloud and precipitation retrievals derived from vertically pointing data can be applied to off-zenith volume scans. Scanning polarization sensitive W-band radar is revealing the degree to which orientation and riming of snow influence the measurement of radar reflectivity at vertical incidence. This has significant implications for the retrieval of snowfall by cloud radars. These issues will be explored more fully in this presentation.
