A high-altitude long-range aircraft configured as a cloud observatory: The NARVAL expeditions

• Published in: Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society
• Main Authors: Stevens, Bjorn, Ament, Felix, Bony, Sandrine, Crewell, Susanne, Ewald, Florian, Gross, Silke, Hansen, Akio, Hirsch, Lutz, Jacob, Marek, Kölling, Tobias, Konow, Heike, Mayer, Bernhard, Wendisch, Manfred, Wirth, Martin, Wolf, Kevin, Bakan, Stephan, Bauer-Pfundstein, Matthias, Brueck, Matthias, Delanoë, Julien, Ehrlich, André, Farrell, David, Forde, Marvin, Gödde, Felix, Grob, Hans, Hagen, Martin, Jäkel, Evelyn, Jansen, Friedhelm, Klepp, Christian, Klingebiel, Marcus, Mech, Mario, Peters, Gerhard, Rapp, Markus, Wing, Allison, Zinner, Tobias
• Other Authors: Max-Planck-Institut für Meteorologie (MPI-M), Max-Planck-Gesellschaft, Universität Hamburg (UHH), Laboratoire de Météorologie Dynamique (UMR 8539) (LMD), Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-École polytechnique (X), Institut Polytechnique de Paris (IP Paris)-Institut Polytechnique de Paris (IP Paris)-École des Ponts ParisTech (ENPC)-Sorbonne Université (SU)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Département des Géosciences - ENS Paris, École normale supérieure - Paris (ENS-PSL), Université Paris Sciences et Lettres (PSL)-Université Paris Sciences et Lettres (PSL)-École normale supérieure - Paris (ENS-PSL), Université Paris Sciences et Lettres (PSL)-Université Paris Sciences et Lettres (PSL), Institut für Geophysik und Meteorologie Köln (IGN), Universität zu Köln = University of Cologne, DLR Institut für Physik der Atmosphäre = DLR Institute of Atmospheric Physics (IPA), Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt Oberpfaffenhofen-Wessling (DLR), Ludwig Maximilian University Munich = Ludwig Maximilians Universität München (LMU), Leipziger Institut für Meteorologie (LIM), Leipzig University / Universität Leipzig, Meteorologische Messtechnik GmbH (METEK), SPACE - LATMOS, Laboratoire Atmosphères, Milieux, Observations Spatiales (LATMOS), Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (UVSQ)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Sorbonne Université (SU)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (UVSQ)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Sorbonne Université (SU)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Caribbean Institute for Meteorology and Hydrology (CIMH), Florida State University Tallahassee (FSU)
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2019
• Subjects: [SDU.STU.ME]Sciences of the Universe [physics]/Earth Sciences/Meteorology; [SDU.OCEAN]Sciences of the Universe [physics]/Ocean; Atmosphere; narval
• Online Access: https://insu.hal.science/insu-01989926; https://insu.hal.science/insu-01989926v1/document; https://insu.hal.science/insu-01989926v1/file/bams-d-18-0198.1.pdf; https://doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-D-18-0198.1

International audience A configuration of HALO (the High-Altitude LOng-range research aircraft) as a remote sensing cloud observatory is described and its use is illustrated with results from the first and second NARVAL (Next-generation Aircraft Remote-sensing for VALidation) field studies. Measurements from NARVAL2 are used to highlight the ability of HALO, when configured in this fashion, to characterize not only the distribution of water condensate in the atmosphere, but also its impact on radiant energy transfer and the co-varying large-scale meteorological conditions – including the large-scale velocity field, and its vertical component. The NARVAL campaigns with HALO demonstrate the potential of airborne cloud observatories to address long-standing riddles in studies of the coupling between clouds and circulation, and are helping to motivate a new generation of field studies.