An overview of microphysical properties of Arctic clouds observed in May and July 1998 during FIRE ACE

Abstract

Microphysical data were collected by the NCAR C‐130 research aircraft during the First International Satellite Cloud Climatology Project (ISCCP) Regional Experiment Arctic Cloud Experiment (FIRE ACE). Boundary layer clouds 100 to 400 m thick were observed on 11 of the 16 missions. The all‐water clouds varied from being adiabatic and homogeneous with monomodal drop spectra to subadiabatic and inhomogeneous with bimodal drop spectra and drizzle. The subadiabatic clouds were observed to be actively mixing near cloud top. The adiabatic clouds provided a test of the performance of the liquid water content (LWC) probes but only in low LWC conditions. A mixed‐phase boundary layer cloud displayed striking variability in the hydrometeor fields on a horizontal scale of 10 km and a vertical scale of 100 m. Cloud Particle Imager (CPI) data showed separate regions with small supercooled cloud drops, supercooled drizzle (at −25°C) and graupel particles. A deep stratus cloud with its base at 2 km (+2°C) and top at 6 km (−25°C) contained drizzle near cloud top and (lower in the cloud) very high (2500 to 4000 L−1) concentrations of ice particles in conditions that did not meet all the Hallett‐Mossop criteria. CPI data showed that an Arctic cirrus cloud was composed of very high (∼100,000 L−1) concentrations of small ice particles interspersed with single, large (mostly bullet rosette) crystals. The data showed that the cirrus cloud was inhomogeneous on scales down to tens of meters. The average ice particle concentrations measured in the cirrus by the FSSP and CPI probes were several hundred to a few thousand per liter, much higher than commonly found in the literature.