Breakout Summary Report
ARM/ASR User and PI Meeting
19 - 23 March 2018
Unmanned Aerial Conveners
19 March 2018
1:30 PM - 3:30 PM
24
Mark Ivey, Gijs deBoer, Mike Ritsche, Beat Schmid
19 March 2018
1:30 PM - 3:30 PM
24
Mark Ivey, Gijs deBoer, Mike Ritsche, Beat Schmid
Breakout Description
This session provided a forum to review and discuss activities that included unmanned aerial systems and tethered balloons at ARM facilities and field campaigns. The session started with short (5-10 minute) overviews of recent activities at SGP, North Slope, and ARM Aerial Facilities including an updateon the new Arctic Shark aircraft.
ASR PIs and ARM infrastructure staff provided short (5-10) minute
updates on science results and challenges of their measurement activities using unmanned aerial vehicles. The session concluded with an open discussion of planned future activities, desired capabilities, and
recent developments in UAS regulations including a new DOE “blanket COA".
Main Discussion
Brief Facilities updates: Beat Schmid, Mike Ritsche, Mark Ivey, Gijs deBoerSchmid: Gave an update on status of the ArcticShark. Have performed lightly instrumented flights in Pendleton. Are now targeting Restricted Area in Yakima Firing Range with goal of flying into clouds. Need COA to enter from outside. Also working on COA for Pasco.
Ritsche: Gave an update on previous campaigns (EPIC, NSFCLOUDMAP, LAFE NOAA Flights). Showed the SGP locations for take-off and landings. Illustrated the process for getting approval to fly a UAS at the SGP and the time could be up to 60 days, although, in general, the process will be much shorter. There was discussion of airspace at the SGP, which was reported to be Class G airspace.
CORRECTION: It should be noted that the airspace over the SGP is Class G up to 1200’ AGL and Class E above 1200’ AGL. Also note the MOA for the Air Force is above 7000’ AGL.
Ivey: Update on FAA Webadapt Software. Introduction of Ferrin Moore.
de Boer: Overview of role of Oliktok Science team and introductions to science-focused presentations.
•Ferrin Moore: DOE OAM. New DOE Blanket COA. ArcticShark COA’s high priority.
Key Findings
- Jessie Creamean provided an overview of ongoing studies to understand the interactions between clouds and aerosol particles using data collected with the ARM TBS. This included information on representativeness of surface-based aerosol measurements, evaluation of the vertical redistribution of aerosol particles through cloud processing, and the relative contributions of above- and below-cloud aerosols to maintaining the cloud structure.- Dari Dexheimer provided examples of data collected using the ARM TBS to advance understanding of mixed-phase clouds. This work is being conducted in collaboration with Erika Roesler from Sandia, who is conducting a variety of large-eddy simulations of observation time periods as part of the AALCO (Aerial Assessment of Liquid in Clouds at Oliktok) effort.
- Sergey Matrosov provided an overview of a recently published study to understand the performance of scanning-radar-derived estimates of ice crystal aspect ratios using in situ measurements collected by the NCAR VIPS operating on the ARM TBS, and using surface-based information on aspect ratios derived from the MASC instrument deployed to Oliktok Point.
- Gijs de Boer provided an overview of how UAS and TBS measurements are currently being used to evaluate initial sea ice formation during the fall of 2016. DataHawk measurements of vertical thermodynamic structure, turbulent fluxes, and surface temperature were used to assess why ice formation in the model appears to have been delayed by several weeks, when compared to observations. It was found that the model sea surface temperature was significantly warmer than observed along the coast, which meant that despite elevated sensible heat fluxes there was simply too much heat in the upper ocean to allow the surface to cool to the freezing point of sea water in the model.