Breakout Summary Report
ARM/ASR User and PI Meeting
13 - 17 March 2017
13 March 2017
1:30 PM - 3:30 PM
25
Beat Schmid and Gijs de Boer
Breakout Description
Nicki Hickmon, Southern Great Plains Site Manager from Argonne National Laboratory, gave an update on unmanned aerial systems at the SGP site. She discussed Southern Great Plains logistics and the unmanned aerial system approval process, and briefed the audience on two small UAS campaigns she has hosted at the SGP site: Environmental Profiling and Initiation of Convection (EPIC) and CLOUDMAP.
Dari Dexheimer, Tethered Balloon Systems Lead from Sandia National Laboratories, gave an update on TBS activities in the framework of the Inaugural Campaigns for ARM Research using Unmanned Aerial Systems (ICARUS). This included flights (total of 140 hours) between October of 2015 and November of 2016. She compared measurements of supercooled liquid water content from tethered balloon systems and microwave radiometry. She also compared temperature measurements using TBS distributed temperature system (optical fiber) radiosondes and a DataHawk small UAS. She also provided a brief on plans for fiscal year 2017.
Fan Mei, ARM Aerial Facility (AAF) Data Manager and UAS Instrumentation Lead from Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, discussed AAF DataHawk small UAS observations during ICARUS in fiscal year 2016. In the fiscal year 2016, UAS flew a total of 27 days between June 5 and August 21, including 74 flights and 61 meaningful research flights (~39 hours), with almost all flights circling 40 m above eddy correlation. There were two coordinated flights with a tethered balloon system deployment on June 10 and 11. Five different pilots/observers from Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and one from the University of Alaska Fairbanks were used. Wind and air temperature comparisons were shown. Both need improvement for fiscal year 2017. AAF is working on it. Also discussed were interesting small-scale surface temperature variations observed with the DataHawks.
Gijs de Boer, Oliktok Point site scientist from the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences, gave an overview of ongoing UAS-related research efforts at Oliktok Point. This included results from tethered balloon systems, DataHawks, and a Pilatus kit plane UAS in the Coordinated Observations of the Arctic Lower Atmosphere (COALA) campaign, ICARUS, and the Evaluation of Routine Atmospheric Sounding Measurements using Unmanned Systems (ERASMUS) campaign. Areas of scientific interest presented include aerosols, sea ice freeze-up, turbulent fluxes, thermodynamic structure, retrieval/model evaluation, and ice crystal habit.
Beat Schmid, AAF Manager from Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, gave an update on the ArcticShark UAS effort. He touched on ARM’s approach to implement the new UAS program, ArcticShark capabilities, operations in Pendleton, Oregon, and status of AAF core instrumentation. He also briefed the group on U.S. Department of Energy special-use airspace at Oliktok, timeline to science flights, and early successes with integration into the National Airspace System.
Mark Ivey, North Slope of Alaska Site Manager from Sandia National Laboratories, led a discussion of unmanned aerial system/tethered balloon system opportunities for fiscal year 2018 and beyond.
Main Discussion
Community Input Major Items
- AAF DataHawks must fly lower than 40 m (hope to achieve with software updates and greater resiliency to radar interference).
- ArcticShark desire to fly instrument to measure crystal habit, instrument to measure new particle formation, collect IN on filters. Small Business Innovation Research awardee asked about interest to fly methane lidar.
- How far can ArcticShark go out over ice? In current configuration probably around 240 nm but this requires significant operational experience and stability and probably deicing (still under development/testing).
- Suggestion of having a fall planning workshop on unmanned aerial systems and tethered balloon systems that is meant to include people beyond the OLI team and operations.