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Moisture and heat budgets of a cirrus cloud from aircraft measurements during FIRE
Author(s) -
Gültepe Ismail,
Rao Gandikota V.
Publication year - 1993
Publication title -
quarterly journal of the royal meteorological society
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.744
H-Index - 143
eISSN - 1477-870X
pISSN - 0035-9009
DOI - 10.1002/qj.49711951306
Subject(s) - cirrus , radiosonde , environmental science , advection , atmospheric sciences , meteorology , radiative transfer , radiometer , geology , remote sensing , geography , physics , quantum mechanics , thermodynamics
This study is based on the NCAR king Air aircraft and radiosonde on 31 October 1986 during the FIRE (First International Satellite Cloud Climatology Project Regional Experiment) in Wisconsin over Oshkosh. Aircraft step‐up and spiral descent flights are used to obtain kinematic and thermodynamic data. In the step‐up manoeuvre, six different penetrations were made between 1528 and 1616 UTC. Each penetration was about 30 km long separated in the vertical by about 300 m. The time difference between the two spiral soundings was about 43 minutes. The aircraft descended at a rate of 1.5 ms −1 during these spiral soundings. Kinematic, cloud physical, and radiometric observations from various instruments are used to estimate the different using the mean longitudinal wind and vertical radiative fluxes are important in forming budgets for the cirrus layers. Ice‐crystal growth is significant in the upper layers. The maintenance of cirrus can be attributed to relatively warm and moist air advection, radiative cooling at upper levels, and moisture advection in the vertical. Turbulent heat and moisture fluxes are found to be significant in the low levels of cirrus.