Snowfall in Northern Finland derives mostly from ice clouds
Clouds and precipitation play a critical role in the Earth's water cycle and energy budget. We present ground-level observations of snowfall coinciding with radiosonde launches in Sodankylä, Finland (67.367 ∘ N, 26.629 ∘ E) through a period of 8 cold months (October–April) in 2019 and 2020. The...
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ftcopernicus:oai:publications.copernicus.org:acp101261 2023-05-15T17:42:30+02:00 Snowfall in Northern Finland derives mostly from ice clouds Mignani, Claudia Zimmermann, Lukas Kivi, Rigel Berne, Alexis Conen, Franz 2022-10-19 application/pdf https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-13551-2022 https://acp.copernicus.org/articles/22/13551/2022/ eng eng doi:10.5194/acp-22-13551-2022 https://acp.copernicus.org/articles/22/13551/2022/ eISSN: 1680-7324 Text 2022 ftcopernicus https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-13551-2022 2022-10-24T16:22:42Z Clouds and precipitation play a critical role in the Earth's water cycle and energy budget. We present ground-level observations of snowfall coinciding with radiosonde launches in Sodankylä, Finland (67.367 ∘ N, 26.629 ∘ E) through a period of 8 cold months (October–April) in 2019 and 2020. They comprise 7401 depositing snow particles detected by a snowflake camera and 468 radiosonde profiles. Our results show that precipitating clouds were extending from ground to at least 2.7 km in altitude. Approximately one-quarter of them were mixed phase and the rest were likely fully glaciated. Estimations of the cloud top temperatures indicate that in roughly half of the snowfall events, ice might have been initiated through heterogeneous freezing. For such cases, the predicted ice-nucleating particle concentrations active at cloud top temperatures could explain the analysed ice crystal particle concentrations observed near ground in approximately one- to two-thirds of the cases. For the rest, ice multiplication was likely active. In a warmer climate, the relative proportion of solid to liquid cloud particles will probably decrease, with implications on the radiation balance. Text Northern Finland Sodankylä Copernicus Publications: E-Journals Sodankylä ENVELOPE(26.600,26.600,67.417,67.417) Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics 22 20 13551 13568 |
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Open Polar |
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Copernicus Publications: E-Journals |
op_collection_id |
ftcopernicus |
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English |
description |
Clouds and precipitation play a critical role in the Earth's water cycle and energy budget. We present ground-level observations of snowfall coinciding with radiosonde launches in Sodankylä, Finland (67.367 ∘ N, 26.629 ∘ E) through a period of 8 cold months (October–April) in 2019 and 2020. They comprise 7401 depositing snow particles detected by a snowflake camera and 468 radiosonde profiles. Our results show that precipitating clouds were extending from ground to at least 2.7 km in altitude. Approximately one-quarter of them were mixed phase and the rest were likely fully glaciated. Estimations of the cloud top temperatures indicate that in roughly half of the snowfall events, ice might have been initiated through heterogeneous freezing. For such cases, the predicted ice-nucleating particle concentrations active at cloud top temperatures could explain the analysed ice crystal particle concentrations observed near ground in approximately one- to two-thirds of the cases. For the rest, ice multiplication was likely active. In a warmer climate, the relative proportion of solid to liquid cloud particles will probably decrease, with implications on the radiation balance. |
format |
Text |
author |
Mignani, Claudia Zimmermann, Lukas Kivi, Rigel Berne, Alexis Conen, Franz |
spellingShingle |
Mignani, Claudia Zimmermann, Lukas Kivi, Rigel Berne, Alexis Conen, Franz Snowfall in Northern Finland derives mostly from ice clouds |
author_facet |
Mignani, Claudia Zimmermann, Lukas Kivi, Rigel Berne, Alexis Conen, Franz |
author_sort |
Mignani, Claudia |
title |
Snowfall in Northern Finland derives mostly from ice clouds |
title_short |
Snowfall in Northern Finland derives mostly from ice clouds |
title_full |
Snowfall in Northern Finland derives mostly from ice clouds |
title_fullStr |
Snowfall in Northern Finland derives mostly from ice clouds |
title_full_unstemmed |
Snowfall in Northern Finland derives mostly from ice clouds |
title_sort |
snowfall in northern finland derives mostly from ice clouds |
publishDate |
2022 |
url |
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-13551-2022 https://acp.copernicus.org/articles/22/13551/2022/ |
long_lat |
ENVELOPE(26.600,26.600,67.417,67.417) |
geographic |
Sodankylä |
geographic_facet |
Sodankylä |
genre |
Northern Finland Sodankylä |
genre_facet |
Northern Finland Sodankylä |
op_source |
eISSN: 1680-7324 |
op_relation |
doi:10.5194/acp-22-13551-2022 https://acp.copernicus.org/articles/22/13551/2022/ |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-13551-2022 |
container_title |
Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics |
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22 |
container_issue |
20 |
container_start_page |
13551 |
op_container_end_page |
13568 |
_version_ |
1766144378893500416 |