Building 33, Room E320
(301) 614-5985 fax: x-5903
The flight was really nice. Our flight legs were 30 minutes in duration (about 300 km in length) at the four alitudes of 15.8, 17.4, 18.9, and 20.4 km. The DLR Falcon's OLEX lidar showed an extensive PSC layer between 14 and 16 km. They also suggested that they saw the ER-2's contrail with their lidar. The NOy and MASP instruments showed an thick PSC layer at the lower altitudes that gradually fell off at the higher altitudes. The descent back into Kiruna also show this extensive PSC layer. Ozone values were about 1.5, 2.2, 2.7, and 3.1 ppm at the 4 altitudes. Water appeared to be a near normal value of 4-5 ppm.
The front passed through Kiruna last night, and caused the temperature to rise about 22 degrees (Fahrenheit) in a single hour! This left us with strong runway cross winds, but these winds should die off by this evening.
ER-2
Cold weather operations requires some special measures. Here we see
ER-2 crew member Gil Cagonot next to a portable gasoline powered heater.
Gil is pretty well bundled up against the cold with his Arctic parka, hat,
and gloves. The heated air is forced through the yellow tubing
into a smaller hose that is seen snaking up the side of the ER-2 and into
the cockpit.
Today's problem wasn't with the ER-2 instrument upload, but with some hackers who've broken into a number of machines here at the Arena. It seems that when our scientists have been transferring data and checking machines back in the US, they've been using insecure forms of communicating across the computer network lines to the US. These hackers install programs (sniffers) that monitor the network for unencrypted account passwords. They then use the sniffer acquired passwords to break into other machines. Many of the investigators here are now changing passwords and trying to remedy this hacker problem instead of focussing on data analysis. This attempt to cure the hacking problem is a major waste of time, money, and effort by a bunch of stratospheric scientists. Good science requires exchange of data, computational resources, and ideas. Hackers force us to erect barriers that stop this free flow of information.
The
DLR Falcon just prior to takeoff on January 31, 2000.
While the ER-2 was in the air, a few of us traveled down to Kiruna for lunch and shopping. We went over to "Carl Wennberg's", a shop that has lots of traditional Lapp (Saami) hats, & other items. Since we're all leaving on Saturday, I found about 6 members of our group wandering in the store. Everybody is preparing to conclude the deployment, and of course, we need to buy gifts for the home folks.
Obviously Greg's forecast for today was right on the money. Terrific winds with awful cross-runway gustiness. We're now planning an 8-hour sortie going over to Russia tomorrow. We plan to take-off at 10 AM (local time), fly east along a streamline into Russian airspace into an area of warmer temperatures. After reaching about 62 E, we'll turn northwest and fly up to Spitsbergen. Our objective on this flight is to sample inner vortex air at a range of temperatures, especially temperature warm enough to melt the PSCs we've been observing on all of our flights. In addition, we'd also like to observe the variation of reactive species during a sunset, and to further scan long-lived trace gases.
ER-2
pilot (J. V. Nystrom) about to board the ER-2 for the flight of January
31. Note the life support crew member (Jim Sokolik) in the background
carrying the ventilator for oxygen and suit cooling (barely visible behind
the pilot). Note that JV is wearing very heavy mittens to keep his
fingers warm (it was 2 F with a wind chill to -23 F yesterday at takeoff),
while Jim Sokolik has neither a hat nor gloves and is wearing sneakers!
I was completely bundled up in my Arctic parka, hat, heavy gloves, boots,
etc., and I was freezing to death.
We did some real-time flight planning this morning when a polar low pushed towards Kiruna faster than anticipated. We then shortened today's ER-2 flight from 8 hours to 4 hours, landing before the estimated time of wind shift passage at 16Z. The polar low was pushed southward by yesterday's storm faster than the forecast model predicted. We scratched off the southern leg of today's flight and a portion of the flight track running up to the pole. The ER-2 took off at 11 AM, and the Falcon followed some 10 minutes later. The Falcon landed at about 2:45 PM, and the ER-2 landed at about 2:56 PM (local time). The instrument control panel failed today about half way through the flight. This caused a lot of worry for about 45 minutes until the plane was rolled into the hangar and the instrument teams began to report complete 4 hour data sets. Even the ILS worked today! The Falcon observed extensive PSC layers along this track and was able to visually spot the ER-2's contrail during the flight. The tracer fields appear to be relatively flat, and we were able to collect alot of in-situ PSC information.
Tommy Thompson has set up a web-site with loads of images of the campaign and other things around Kiruna.
We're currently planning another vortex survey tomorrow to complement Dee Porter's northern flight of January 20. JV Nystrom will be flying tomorrow. We'll initially fly southward to get towards the edge of the vortex, followed by a return up to Kiruna, a turn towards Spitsbergen, and another leg up towards 85N. After reaching 85 N, the plane will turn back southward towards Spitsbergen and do a dive down from about 65,000 feet to 52,000. JV will then fly back to Kiruna by way of another overpass of Spitsbergen. The total flight time will be about 8 hours, with a scheduled takeoff of about 11 AM. The flight objectives are to scan the long-lived trace gases and ozone for possible changes since January 20, look for denitrification and dehydration, make further measurements of polar stratospheric clouds, measure ClO and other reactive gases in the sunlight towards our south, and measure reservoir species in the vortex collar.
We hoped to get the big Mk-IV balloon payload off the ground today, but they had to scrub due to high surface winds. However, the HALOZ payload, TRIPLE payload, and a water vapor sonde all were launched from Esrange yesterday. We went down to Esrange this evening (about a 35 km drive) to hear some of the results of these balloon flights. Some very interesting data from the TRIPLE payload showing high ClO in their vertical profile upto about 25 km or so. Darin Toohey reports on the HALOZ launch:
The Haloz balloon payload was successfully launched at Esrange today (January 27) at about 1:20 local time. After an ascent to 26 km, a valve was opened on the balloon for a controlled descent to 12 km. Real-time telemetry from the U. Wyoming instruments indicated that the ozone and particle instruments obtained good data for the duration of the flight. Analysis of CFC-11 and ClO data await return of the payload to Esrange, which could be as soon as Saturday. Minimum temperatures below -82 degrees C were observed in several narrow layers between 40 and 25 mbar.Both the DC-8 and Falcon flights of yesterday were also very successful. Not as many PSCs as on Wednesday, but a number of very interesting observations.
Brian Toon, Steve Eckerman and I drove on down to Esrange late this afternoon to hear some talks on the THESEO balloon results. Unfortunately, we had to gas up the car before we departed from Kiruna on the 35 km drive to Esrange. How many Phd scientists do you think it takes to fill the tank of a car? You need more than three! Of course Swedish instructions didn't help, and the automatic money feed into the machine didn't work either. Finally the little female cashier came out to help us pump the gas. The bill came to about $50 (420 kroner) for 1 tank of gas.
This flight into Russia of the ER-2 is quite an accomplishment. Phil Decola and Mike Kurylo of NASA HQ put in a great effort to get the Russian clearance for the ER-2 and DC-8. In particular, Phil literally contacted dozens of people and traveled to Moscow at least twice to gain this clearance. In addition, Russian Air Force General Valery Zakharin has been extremely helpful in getting these clearances. As a scientist, I realize the importance of being able to sample stratospheric weather, no matter where it takes us, yet this flight over Russia represents a real cooperative achievement. It wasn't long ago that a flight of the ER-2 would have been an extremely serious incident between the US and Russia. Today it represent a joint will to understand stratospheric ozone. I'm personally extremely grateful to everyone who's contributed to making this flight happen. In particular, I'd like to thank our pilots: Dee Porter (who's actually flew today) and Jan (J.V.) Nystrom (our ground pilot or mobile). I asked these guys before the flight how they felt. JV said, "It's time to put the past behind us," and Dee added, "and look forward to the future."
The ER-2 instruments generally performed quite well. In spite
of failing during load-up, the ACATS gas chromatograph unexpectedly worked
in flight. The CIMS instrument only measured the first 10% of the
flight. We did manage to fly through the edge of the vortex (as indicated
by N2O, CO2, and H2O). We also saw lots of ClO and dimer in the vortex,
and virtually none outside of the vortex. The NO/NOy instrument saw
more particles in a PSC, and possibly some denitrification.
In
a photo taken just before today's flight we see ER-2 project scientists
and pilots standing in front of the ER-2. From left to right are
Prof. Jim Anderson, Pilot Dee Porter, Pilot Jan (JV) Nystrom, and Dr. Paul
A. Newman.
A whole bunch of us went and toured the LKAB iron mine here in Kiruna yesterday. We all boarded a bus at the headquarters building, and were just getting started when a Volvo station wagon with two yellow-jacketed fellows sped into the parking lot. All of the rental cars we're using are Volvo station wagons, and Dryden issued yellow jackets to all their people, so it was clear that they were there for the tour. Our bus driver spotted them and shouted something in Swedish back to our LKAB tour guide. We first watched them pull into the director's parking lot. After a moment of hesitation and some obvious discussion in the car, the two yellow jackets realized their error, reversed direction, and sped over to the proper lot. They both jumped from the car and ran towards the bus. Everyone on the bus is watching this, and as they approach we all recognize the two yellow jackets: our ER-2 pilots Jan Nystrom and Dee Porter. They boarded, and we then drove the bus directly into a mine tunnel that gradually descended to a depth of 1770 feet (540 m). The tunnel was very large and could easily handle two lanes of traffic. They took us down to an older tunnel where they've set up a small museum, some heavy equipment, and a theater. After showing us a film, they demonstrated the drilling and excavation with a loader. We had some coffee, and admired some of their iron products. We then toured the museum and saw how they used to dig the mine by hand. The LKAB mine is truly an impressive display of modern mining.
We've been viewing beautiful displays of PSCs around Kiruna for the last 2 days. The clouds are truly mesmerizing as they change their iridescent rainbow colors, something like the beautiful coloring of opals. Randy Kawa captured an image with the digital camera, but the coloring just isn't quite right. I guess you just have to be here to see them in their full display. So every day we're given a heavenly of clouds, followed occasionally on the clear nights by the aurora borealis. Mike Kurylo captured a nice image of the aurora on his digital camera from early Sunday morning.
The PSC balloon flew yesterday evening. Niels Larsen reports:
The second PSC analysis gondola was flown very successfully 26 January, launch 19.47. The balloon was maneuvered in 3 up/down movements through a PSC layer between 38 and 24 hPa with back scatter ratios up to 13 at 940 nm. In this altitude range we stayed inside PSC for nearly the whole flight and all instruments worked without problems.Brian Toon's brief report on the DC-8 flight of yesterday (expect to receive the JGR reprint volume on this flight next week):I would like to thank the CNES team for an excellent flight, both in forecasting the short launch window with low ground winds and in operating the balloon which made it possible to obtain a wealth of PSC data without loosing much flight time outside the PSC layers.
During the path finding soundings prior to the main flight, we lost one backscatter sonde due to strong ground winds.
Large ice wave clouds are evident to the west of the aircraft. DIAL lidar shows a PSC from 22 to 24 km that is highly depolarizing at both wavelengths and has a back scatter ratio of 2 to 7. This is probably an ice cloud. At 0830 UT we were under an extensive bank of what appear to be ice clouds. Heavy PSCs are visible to the south. These clouds extend in two layers from 18 to 21 km and 22 to 24 km. Some waves are evident in the clouds, though we are not near land. The lidars suggest there may be a faint PSC down to 15 km. At about 0920 UT LASE observed a tropopause fold below us. There are also nice waves in the tropospheric water vapor field. The PSCs from 18 to 20 km are still ice clouds. At 69N, extensive ice PSCs remain above the aircraft. These obviously extend off to the east of the aircraft over Norway. These clouds clearly have nothing to do with mountain waves, but may be initiated by the jet stream that is pushed north here, as well as inertial gravity waves shed from the jet. As we proceeded southward, the Type 2 PSCs disappeared by 66N, to be replaced by Type 1a. These disappeared around 63N. From 63N to 59N we observed no PSCs on the DIAL or Hostetler lidars, though MTP temperatures were low enough for type 1A from 15 to 20 km. Over southern Norway we again encountered cirrus at flight level in patches. These contained particulate NOy in about 10 ppb/20 = 500 ppt; however no NOy is missing from the gas phase. HCN appears insufficient to account for it and is also not changing in the cirrus. N2O does not have enough sensitivity to determine easily if it is changing. Possibly there are small nitrate particles. If these were larger than about 0.1 µm then they would not enter the backward facing NOy inlet, but if they were then added to the ice particles they would appear as particulate NOy. At 1240 UT, we were above the local tropopause and a type 1a cloud appeared (about 61N). The cloud was about 1 km thick, near 23 to 24 km. Numerous wave clouds, probably ice, were present to the west of the aircraft. Generally these were of small physical dimension. Beginning at 1300 UT and along the start of the sun run, an ice PSC was located from 20 to 23 km above the aircraft. This cloud was visually very obvious as an extensive deck of white clouds spread above a blue gap on the horizon to about 30 degrees. It was not easily visible above the aircraft. At 1340 UT the ice cloud was optically thick above the aircraft. About 1346 UT we left the ice cloud just at the coast of Norway. Possibly there was a small type 1a cloud, or at least a fainter portion of the cloud just of the coast for about 3 to 5 min of flight time. Beyond that nothing was present, even though MTP temperatures cross the type 1a line at about 16 km. Visually, however, there are still clouds on the horizon. These are much fainter than the water ice clouds that we flew under previously. At 1407 UT we began to climb to 41 kft, above the cirrus. A cloud with a scattering ratio of 0.5 was present from 21 to 22 km in the DIAL lidar. This cloud had depolarization. Very faint wispy clouds were present on the horizon. At 1417 UT a type 1a cloud with a back scatter of 1.3 was above us. We seemed to be clear of the cirrus. The type 1a cloud was from 23 to 24 km. Ahead of us there seems to be a very distinct layer cloud, probably in the stratosphere near the POAM point. From 1400 UT there was no type 1a cloud until about 1405 UT, then there were clouds off and on until the POAM point. The cloud seemed to appear and vanish within about 5 min of flight time. We saw at least 4 appearances of the cloud over about 20 min. As the sun began to set, clouds were visible above the aircraft. It appeared that near the POAM point type 1a clouds were present near 24 to 26 km. MTP temperatures were cold enough for type 1a, but not for ice. At about 1515 UT we crossed the coast of Norway near 66N, 15E, and the Hostetler lidar reported seeing an ice cloud. This cloud is located from about 23 to 25 km altitude. Visually the horizon above the aircraft is covered in cloud. The cloud descended by about 2 or 3 km over the 30 min from the west coast of Norway to the eastern coast of Sweden. The scattering ratio declined to that point and then increased again. Essentially the waves seem to be repeating over about 30 min of flight time. At 1555 UT, the second cloud began to fade. These clouds seem to be about 200 km across with a spacing between them of about 150 km. This space also contains particles, probably also ice, but perhaps type 1a. The fact that we saw multiple periodic type 1a clouds upwind of the ice clouds suggests that the ice is not needed to form the type 1a. Between about 1530 and 1620 UT, at the top of the ice cloud near 23 km, there is a separate cloud which is less back scattering and more depolarizing than the ice cloud. This may be a type 1a cloud that lies on top of the ice cloud in the part of the wave that is not cold enough for ice. A similar, but less distinct, layer seems to appear at the base of the cloud. At 1600 UT this upper layer actually rises steeply in altitude while the ice cloud descends and dissipates. MTP contours show the waves growing in amplitude as they propagate upward. The ice cloud disappeared at 1650 UT as we approached the border between Norway and Sweden. After about a 5 min break, we observed another type 1a (i.e., low backscatter depolarizing ) cloud that is upwind of the ice cloud. Then we observed an ice cloud upwind of that. In this case the type 1a cloud forms a halo around the ice cloud. This halo could be small freshly formed ice crystals or it could be type 1a. This general pattern repeated on the turn.
Today's flight would have aimed at sampling the edge of the polar vortex and some tremendous mountain forced wave clouds along the Norwegian Alps. The DLR Falcon will takeoff at about noon to sample these waves along with the NASA DC-8.
Dr. Joe Farman visited us yesterday. Joe discovered the Antarctic ozone hole back in 1985 along with his colleagues Jonathan Shanklin and Brian Gardiner. Joe is supposedly retired, but still continues to do work and participate in field campaigns. Thanks to Joe for getting this SOLVE and THESEO stuff going 15 years ago.
As I mentioned on Friday, the landing time will be about 1:30 PM local time. Jan Nystrom (today's ER-2 pilot) will fly northwest over Norway and out to sea some distance, then turning around back towards the southeast and flying with a direct tailwind over Kiruna and down to southern Sweden out over the Baltic Sea, and then turning back and landing in Kiruna. The DC-8 will fly a similar flight path, and will rendezvous with the ER-2 at about 35,000 feet as the ER-2 is returning to Kiruna. By flying the aircraft through the same air, we'll get a reasonable comparison of instruments measuring the same molecules. The ER-2 should land at about 1:30 PM, and the DC-8 will continue off towards Greenland to examine some very interesting temperature fluctuations which are spawned by the mountains of Greenland.
The City of Kiruna invited all of the scientists involved with THESEO and SOLVE to a dinner at the city hall. There was a tremendous crowd, since there are more than 350 scientists here and at Esrange. We had good food, lots of company, and entertainment by a group of singers. We even had an aurora borealis display as we were leaving. The unfortunate aspect was that we were flying today, so most of us had to leave early in the evening to get some rest before the flight.
Had a lovely dinner last night that was hosted by Dan Jangblad of the Swedish Space Corporation. Jim Anderson, Mike Kurylo, Brian Toon, Lamont Poole, Ken Carslaw, and I drove down to Jukkasjarvi to the Wardshus Restaurant where we met with a number of the balloon investigators who are down at Esrange. Started the dinner with a lovely fish roe (caviar or fish eggs) appetizer, had ptarmigan (a snow grouse), and finished with an ice cream dessert with cloud berries. Good food with good science comrades.
The European Union's Research Commissioner, Mr. P. Busquin, visited SOLVE and THESEO 2000 here in Kiruna today. We pulled the French ARAT into the hangar, roped off the aircraft, and then brought about 10 film crews into the Arena Arctica hangar. They interviewed Mr. Busquin, Mike Kurylo, and our pilots. A couple of crews interviewed me, but they didn't get any good quotes. Remember that my camera presence is akin to a deer caught in the headlights of a speeding car.
There have been a couple of problems identified with the ER-2 that we're been trying to fix in preparation for a flight on Sunday. A VOR is a Very high frequency Omnidirectional Radio signal that pilots use to guide their aircraft along the airways (air highways) in the sky. Unfortunately, the ER-2 VOR has been failing during flight. This is a major problem, since poor weather makes it extremely difficult for landing. We spent today trying to identify the reasons behind the VOR failure by loading all of our instruments this morning at 10 AM, and then running tests by turning on and off the various instruments to see if they affected the VOR. The problem is apparently fixed, and we should be able to fly on Sunday.
The Sunday flight will have a local takeoff time of about 8 AM, with a landing time of about 1 PM local time (a 5 hour flight). We intend on flying northwest over Norway and out to sea some distance, then turning around back towards the southeast and flying back with the a direct tailwind over Kiruna and down to southern Finland, and then turning back and landing in Kiruna. This path will carry us into the dark up north, and the flight leg to Finland will carry us through the sunrise. This flight is intended to check how the rising sun affects the chemistry of ozone loss.
Big day tomorrow for the visiting press and dignitaries, since the European Union's Research Commissioner, Mr. P. Busquin, plans to visit SOLVE and THESEO 2000 here in Kiruna tomorrow. Unfortunately, his planned visit is scheduled during our regular daily 1:30 PM meeting. In any case, one of our resident PSC experts, Ken Carslaw, is giving the stratospheric weather briefing, so I'll have to miss meeting Mr. Busquin.
This coordinated flight was a really great success. The DC-8 detected extensive layers of PSCs running up past Spitsbergen towards the pole, and was able to direct the ER-2 into those layers. These PSCs were sampled by the MASP instrument, which showed that they were on the order of 5-10 microns. The NO/NOy instrument's NOy measurement showed denitrification, while the Harvard water instrument showed little evidence of dehydration. The vortex was relatively well mixed, since measurements of long-lived traces such as N2O and CO2 had relatively small variations after we entered the vortex. The chlorine measurements showed that most of the reactive chlorine inside the polar vortex had been converted into either ClO or dimer. The outbound leg of the flight was at about 430 K while the highest potential temperature was seen near Kiruna just before landing at about 460 K. The temperatures were generally quite cold, with coldest temperatures of about -83 C (190 K or -117 F). The objectives of the flight were to sample the vortex for trace gases and chlorine compounds, and to make measurements of PSCs. We certainly achieved these objectives due to the hard work of a huge number of people and the dedication and courage of our pilot: Dee Porter.
In other good news, the Theseo-2000 PSC analysis balloon payload was launched last night. Niels Larsen reports:
The first PSC-analysis gondola was launched from Esrange Wed 19 Jan at 21.54 LT. On ascent we observed a PSC layer between 35 and 45 hPa with moderate backscatter ratios up to 4.7 at 940 nm. Another more thin PSC layer was observed between 25 and 30 hPa with higher backscatter ratios up to 7.5. The upper layer was penetrated 4 times in two ascent/descent manouvres. All instuments provided data without problems during ascent and in the upper-layer penetrations; however during the final descent, we had a failure for the mass spectrometer and in the telecommand, also causing problems for the water vapor measurements.
The DC-8's alternate plan is to investigate predicted mountain waves over Greenland. The plane was scheduled to takeoff at about 11:00 AM, but the failure of the DADS system aboard the plane also forced them to scrub.
Our plan is to try and fly both the DC-8 and the ER-2 tomorrow along the same track as was proposed today. Wish us luck with the weather gods.
We observed beautiful PSCs overhead all day long today. We first started seeing them early this morning, and we continued to observer them all day long. The PSCs in late afternoon (3:15 pm) were exceptionally colored. While PSCs are quite beautiful, they are one of the principal culprits in ozone loss. Certain chlorine compounds are converted on the surfaces of these cloud particles into forms that are highly reactive (i.e., ClO) which can destroy ozone at a very rapid rate. Very cold temperatures in the stratosphere allow PSCs to form, chlorine is activated on the surfaces of these PSCs, this reactive chlorine can then destroy ozone with the aid of just a bit of sunlight.
The French ARAT aircraft should be arriving in Kiruna tomorrow with the backscatter lidar on board. The ARAT will be coordinating its flights with the PSC balloon package that should be launched from Esrange over the next few days. The Triple balloon payload will also be launched tomorrow. In addition, Terry Deshler, Darin Toohey, and Neil Harris will also be launching their small balloon payload tomorrow.
Two persons from NASA Dryden public affairs arrived here in Kiruna today to take still shots and some video of the SOLVE activities. They filmed and interviewed a number of people today including myself. If you can picture a scared deer caught in headlights that is mumbling incoherently, then you have a pretty good impression of how my interview went. A really great shot was Darrel Winfield wearing his viking helmet while he discussed safety and security during our regular meeting.
Most of us are eating breakfast at our hotels (bread, cereal, juice, coffee, cheese, and sliced meats), but were typically eating lunch and dinner at the Takeoff Restaurant that's right here at the Kiruna airport. So far, my favorite lunches are the Thursday pea soup and pancakes, and the daily reindeer toast. My favorite dinner is the salmon. The Takeoff's weekly set of lunch and dinner specials is always interesting, and usually quite good. I'm particularly interested in the exact contents of this coming Friday's "Knuckle of pork with mashed swedes."
Yesterday's DC-8 flight was very good. Brian Toon reports:
After leaving Sweden we flew just below the tropopause. At that time we were in light cirrus. NOy reported that the ice crystals had NOy on them; CIMS saw HNO3 increase as we climbed out of the cirrus before we hit the tropopause.The Hostetler lidar and DIAL reported seeing a PSC near 23 km altitude at about 0830 to 0845 UT. The ir scattering ratio was about 0.4. Sunlight made the depolarization difficult to quantify, but the clouds appear to DIAL to be depolarizing in both the infrared and visible. This cloud is well out on the edge of the vortex, as predicted. From 0850 on a depolarizing PSC was present near 20 km, where MTP temperatures were on the NAT condensation line. After approximately 0900, a PSC appeared at 18 km or maybe below. At that time three layers of PSC were present at 17 to 18 km, 19 to 20 km, and 20 to 21 km. All three layers were depolarizing in the infrared. The ASUR instrument reports that ClO is present in the lower stratosphere in the vortex, but it did not see any when we left Kiruna and were outside the vortex. At 0945, as we approached the beginning of the sun run, PSCs were seen from 17 to about 19 km altitude. The ir scattering ratio was about 0.25, and they were depolarizing. The infrared depolarization ratio was about 0.1. At the turn to begin the sun run, numerous waves were present in the cloud deck below us. A possible stratospheric ice cloud was present well to the south of the aircraft. During the sun run a contrail was present on the horizon. The PSC continued and filled the region from 17 to about 20 km. At the POAM footprint the PSC seemed to be present only as a thin layer near 20 km. As we turned north the PSC faded, but something remained from 20 to 23 km, possibly in two layers. It was also slightly depolarizing. We could see these clouds visually. Toward the north they appear as a red or purple glow above the dark blue shadow of the Earth. To the west, two layers of PSC were clear on the horizon. As we approached Novaya Zemlya, Hostetler reported that we encountered a thin but highly backscattering cloud (ratio of 2.5) near 20 km. As we continued onward several thin layers appeared between 18 and 20 km. AROTEL reports seeing waves in the vertical temperature profiles. At 1125 a PSC was observed near 16 km, in addition to the others. Again, these layers were highly depolarizing. Possibly these clouds are enhanced by flow over the island; however, they continued upwind of the island in a less intense fashion. Likewise, they continued upwind of Frans Josef Land. Generally clouds seemed to be continuous from about 17 to 20 km and were still present at 1330 UT. As we approached Spitsbergen the PSCs disappeared. This disappearance coincided with the predicted edge of the vortex; however, AROTEL and MTP temperatures are quite low in this region, lower than forecast and as low or lower than in regions in which PSCs were seen. Numerous waves were seen in AROTEL and in situ data near Spitsbergen; however, it is not clear that any PSCs were present. There were some variations in the scattering seen by DIAL, but these may have been in the sulfate aerosols. At 1530 UT we saw very high numbers of condensation nuclei in situ which correspond with a low ozone layer at 15 km seen by DIAL. This low ozone layer corresponds with an enhanced backscatter, but it is too warm to be a PSC. MTP sees very little structure in the vertical temperature profile in this region and it is quite warm (around 220 K). All of this seems to correspond to a pool of warm air that was forecast off the coast of Norway in the 1200 UT ASM forecast. We had to cut the flight slightly short due to a cabin pressure problem, and therefore missed the opportunity to observe the large gravity wave over Norway.
The ER-2 instrument groups will be putting their labs together and working on instruments today and tomorrow. The first ER-2 science flight is scheduled for Tuesday. The principal goals of this first flight will be to survey the polar vortex and search for PSCs. We will try and coordinate this flight with the DC-8, using the DC-8 lidars to survey the vortex for PSCs, and then vectoring the ER-2 into those PSCs. PSCs are faint and tenuous, and difficult to visually spot in the polar night conditions. The DC-8 lidars will provide a precise fix of the PSC altitude, and we can then use the DC-8 radio to direct the ER-2.
The C-141 cargo plane with Wendy Dolci and many of our ER-2 investigators was stuck in Iceland for most of today. Yesterday, the plane had a late start from Westover at about 1:30 pm EST (7:30 PM Kiruna time) because of de-icing and an engine problem. The plane landed in Iceland and refueled, but was further delayed because clearance through Norwegian airspace was not obtained before the aircrew rest period took effect. After the rest period, they took off from Iceland this afternoon and finally arrived in Kiruna at about 8:10 PM. By 10:15 PM the 9 pallets weighing 60,000 lbs. had been pulled apart, and the boxes of hardware had been distributed into the various labs.
Above is a picture of pilot Jan Nystrom arriving in Kiruna, Sweden on January 14, 2000. After sitting the ER-2 cockpit in a pressure suit for over 7 hours, you'd be smiling too. See a couple of other shots of Jan in my SOLVE images archive, and a picture of the ER-2 taxing up to the Arena Arctica in Kiruna.
The DC-8 is planning to do a flight tomorrow towards the east to look at a lobe of the vortex that is moving south over Russia. The plan is to takeoff tomorrow morning at about 8 AM, fly east to about 60 N, 60 E, perform a sun run, and then fly north to sample the region of cold temperatures near 80N and 60 E. The DC-8 will then fly over Ny Alesund, and then return to Kiruna. The flight objectives are to observe the high ClO in the vortex, observe the perturbed columns concentrations in the vortex, do a satellite underpass, examine PSCs to the north near Novaya Zemlya, overfly the Ny Alesund station lidar, and observe mountain forced gravity waves near Spitzbergen Island.
Greg Forbes of the Weather Channel has now set up his forecast discussion for Kiruna.
The ER-2 took off from Westover, MA at about 7:30 AM this morning. The plane arrived in Kiruna at 8:45 PM (local Kiruna time or Central European Time) with a mighty happy pilot (Jan Nystrom). After the passage of yesterday's storm, the winds at Westover, MA became northerly. At 7 AM the Westover temperature was about 3 F with a 16 mph northerly wind, and by 10 AM (the approximate time of the C-141 takeoff) the Westover temperature had warmed up to 10 F. In contrast, the Kiruna, Sweden temperature is now about 23 F. Amazing that the Kiruna temperature above the Arctic circle is 13 degrees warmer than Massachusetts. Welcome to Kiruna!
Wendy Dolci's report on yesterdays failed takeoff:
Today's ER-2 flight was aborted during the takeoff roll, due to an air data computer shutdown; the likely cause of the shutdown was the inclement weather.Our expert weather forecaster is Dr. Greg Forbes who works for the Weather Channel arrived in Kiruna late last night.About 5 inches of snow fell in the Springfield area today. The snow has now stopped but the forecast for the morning is for cold (0-6 degrees tonight without wind chill factor) and high winds. Since it will be crosswinds on the main runway, the ER-2 will take off on the alternate runway at Westover. The schedule will be the same: 0300-0500-0700. There is a fairly good chance that the winds will exceed 30 knots tomorrow morning, but we want to hang in there in case there is any chance of taking off.
The C-141 will have to be de-iced before takeoff. Estimated departure time for the C-141 is 10:00 (+/- 30 mins., depending on how long it takes to de-ice). We will load the cargo and board the aircraft, then taxi to the de-icing area, as they cannot do it at the current parking spot due to EPA regulations. A stop for fuel in Iceland is still planned.
Wendy Dolci is truly being introduced to the ups and downs of ER-2 missions. I don't have a written report about today's problems, but here's her report from yesterday's (Wed., 1/12) attempted flight:
Today's flight was scrubbed prior to takeoff, due to ~30 knot cross winds at Westover, thick fog at Kiruna, and continuing problems with the ER-2 VOR navigational system, which is a requirement for landing at the airport Kiruna. The day was spent diagnosing the VOR problem, which turned out to be interference associated with the HOx instrument. Shielding has been added to the instrument; the ER-2 will take off tomorrow and the VOR tested en route. If necessary, HOx will be turned off for the transit flight.The DC-8 transit flight was scheduled to leave last night, but was delayed because of a fuel leak in the center tank of the DC-8. The transit flight is scheduled for tonight, and should arrive in Kiruna at about 11 AM tomorrow morning.The weather forecast is a concern for tomorrow; the winds are expected to decrease, but there is a snowstorm headed this way. However, the pilots do not expect it to prevent the ER-2 from taking off, based on current information.
Tomorrow's ER-2 takeoff will be at 0700, instead of 0800, with a 2 hour upload. Takeoff for the C-141 is set for 0900. Here we go again. Third try's a charm?
Markus Rex, Hansjurg Jost, and I visited Uwe Raffalski at the Swedish IRF here in Kiruna last night. Uwe showed us high ground based microwave profiler (measuring O3, HNO3, ClO, and N2O), the FTIR system, and the all sky auroral camera system. For more information about the ground systems at IRF, see the optical lab link and call Uwe for a tour. Uwe also showed us the satellite test facility, and a small satellite that some of the IRF students are building to do space weather. We finished the evening with a nice plenk-stek (sp.?) dinner and a nice local lager beer.
The ER-2 had a very good transit flight to Westover on Sunday. Experimenters were able to work on instruments Monday, and they had a small press event for the local media. The ER-2 took off from Westover yesterday at 8 AM (EST), but developed troubles along the way. Wendy Dolci is handing these transit flights. Wendy reports:
The ER-2 and C-141 took off from Westover this morning as planned. Due to a problem with the navigation system, the ER-2 turned around and headed back to Westover approximately 2.5 hours into the flight. The C-141 had been airborne for ~1.5hours , and also turned at that point and headed back to Westover.Stratospheric meteorological conditions: Temperatures are below 195 K over an extensive area in the polar, and will be about 190 K above Kiruna today. Again, the stratospheric polar vortex is overhead today.All of the science instruments performed well on today's flight. MMS worked fine. The WAS canisters were used and there are none available for tomorrow's flight, so WAS will fly the transit without canisters.
The ER-2 problem has been fixed and we will try again tomorrow. The take off times for tomorrow will be the same as today's: ER-2 at 0800 and C-141 at 0900. There will be a 2 hour upload, instead of a 3 hour upload as we did today.
I arrived in Kiruna yesterday at about noon. The flight over was trying, but not as stressful as the C-141 transit. I was supposed to fly from National/Reagan in DC to NY Kennedy, then onto Stockholm, and then upto Kiruna. They first canceled my flight to Kennedy shortly after I checked in. After weeping and whining at the counter, they rebooked me into La Guardia in New York (which was again delayed but not canceled), and then they took me by bus to Kennedy. With many assurances by my bus driver, they dropped me off at terminal 2 at 6:00 PM for my 6:05 PM flight. Unfortunately, the flight was leaving from terminal 3! I hauled my baggage to terminal 3 (no small task with a cracked upper arm bone), and got to the counter at 6:15 PM. Fortunately the plane was delayed (to 6:50 PM) and all of the seats were taken, so they upgraded me to business class! Everything thereafter was quite pleasant. There were quite a few investigators onboard the Stockholm-Kiruna flight, and Kathy Wolfe was here to greet us as we exited the plane. We all trooped over to the Arena Arctica, acquired our badges, and I went off to check into the E-10 hotel (the E-10 is named after the highway that runs from Kiruna over to Narvik in Norway). Nosirree, I'm not staying at the Ice Hotel.
As I drove into town yesterday afternoon after sunset (about 2:45 PM), I looked up and beheld the first polar stratospheric cloud (PSC) that I'd ever seen from the ground. A beautiful iridescent bright cloud set against a background of low dark clouds. Since the PSC is so high (over 60,000 feet up), the sun still illuminates them after the sun has set on the ground. Hence, they're very bright and iridescent. After seeing this PSC, you can certainly understand why they're called mother-of-pearl clouds. Tommy Thompson of the NOAA Aeronomy Lab captured an image of one of the PSCs that was quite low on the horizon. If you click on his image, you can see the PSC as the brightly illuminated cloud in the center of the image. Bruce Gandrud took 2 photos of the PSC. The first image is rather low on the horizon, while the second image is shown below.
In Bruce Gandrud and Jim Dye's words:
The PSC was quite spectacular and changed quite a bit during the 45-60 minutes we watched it. This cloud started off with a well defined leeward edge which changes over 15-20 minutes of time to the long trailing leeward edge seen in this image. We speculate what happened during this time is that the PSC formed as liquid/solution droplets which then transformed to solid and formed the leeward tail.Lets hope that we can get the ER2 through one of these events!!!
We're currently planning an 8 hour transit flight to Kiruna from Westover with an 8 AM EST takeoff. The transit flight will take us up over the southern tip of Greenland, along the Denmark Strait (between Greenland and Iceland), just northward of Iceland, and over the Norwegian Sea upto northern Sweden. This should get us to Kiruna at about 11 PM local time in Kiruna. The C-141 will immediately follow the ER-2 (about 9 AM), and should arrive in Kiruna an hour or two later. The C-141 has a heavy load, and will require a refueling stop in Iceland.
Wendy Dolci is handling the ER-2 and C-141 transit flights from Westover to Kiruna. The weather looks good at Westover, and reasonable in Kiruna for a late night arrival. Greg Forbes is currently forecasting Kiruna weather as southerly winds at 10-15 kts with no precipitation for midnight on January 12. Hopefully Wendy's unruly mob of scientist passengers on the 141 will be manageable. I told Wendy that the ER-2 scientists are all a bunch of pussycats. However, we all know the difficulty of herding cats. Tom Hanisco of the Harvard group (son in-law of Sue Johnson) will be on the flight with Wendy and the rest of the gang. Tom has probably racked up more frequent flyer miles on C-141's than any other ER-2 investigator. As you all know, these frequent flyer miles are redeemable for future ER-2 mission C-141 transit flights. There's nothing like the spartan, cold, dark, and deafening interior of the C-141 cargo area to make you appreciate commercial airliners.
I'm leaving for Kiruna today and should arrive at about noontime tomorrow in Kiruna. I thought I'd be pleased to be at home watching my Seahawks in the NFL football playoffs yesterday. However, I now know that trying to sleep in coach class on an international flight with my cracked arm bone is more pleasant than watching the Seahawk offense.
Stratospheric conditions and forecast:
Fortunately, the stratospheric polar vortex continues to remain quite cold. The temperatures have been below 190 K (-83 C or -117 F) up at about 20 km (70,000 feet), so it's nearly been cold enough to form ice particles in the stratosphere. The northern polar vortex has been fairly quiescent over the last few weeks. The forecasts show a lobe of the vortex coming down over Kiruna in the next couple of days. Hence, it will get much colder directly overhead as we proceed towards mid-week. In addition, the path of the ER-2 transit will take the plane directly through the edge of the vortex and into temperatures that are just below 195 K. The vortex will elongate across the pole forming a wave 2 pattern that will slowly rotate eastward, carrying the lobe of the vortex that will be above Kiruna off to the east by Saturday.
Today's flight was a qualified success. The two aircraft systems that were of concern worked well. The Iridium system worked flawlessly; the HF ALE system worked but with some problems that are attributed to the temporary antenna that was used just for today's flight. It is expected that the antenna in Sweden will work well.On Wednesday, I reported that the PSC analysis group was heading to Sweden to launch their heavy lift balloon. However, the latest forecasts are not very favorable for the formation of PSCs. Hence, Neils Larsen and Konrad Mauersberger have decided to put the balloon launch on hold.There were no instrument failure lights and all instruments appear to have gotten data. Most have confirmed good data, though not all instruments have processed data. The mission was a 5 hour flight to the south with an overpass of the Miramar radiosonde station on the outbound and inbound legs. There was a vertical profile to 52 kft which terminated at the southernmost point at 20o 40'N.
There was an issue with noise on the VHF radio when the pilot (Dee Porter) was near Dryden on the return leg. The noise cleared when Q1 was turned off on the ground. It is not clear, however, that Q1 (MMS) is the source of the noise. We will do some minimal testing with MMS in the morning, but otherwise we are mission ready and will proceed with the C-141 pack and load and the ER-2 departure on Sunday. The configuration flown today was the same as that on the successful (no radio noise) flight on 16 December, except that the Iridium antenna has been installed on the upper Qbay hatch with attendant wiring changes.
I'll be leaving DC for Kiruna on Monday, and arriving in Kiruna at 11:50 AM on the SAS flight. Fortunately I'll be here on Sunday to watch the Seattle Seahawks whip the Miami Dolphins.
We're still aiming to leave for Westover, MA on Sunday at 7 AM PST. As many of you know, we'll be carrying a lot of science lab hardware on a military C-141 cargo plane, courtesy of the 452nd from March AFB, California. The science hardware is carefully stacked upon a metal plate that is about 8 feet by 8 feet square. Just like playing a giant game of tetris. The stack is about 8 feet high, roughly forming a cube. Heavy netting is looped around and over this cube, with heavy strapping. These cubes of stuff are called pallets, and approximately 9-10 can be put onto a C-141 aircraft with about 30 seats for passengers. Quite a job to get all of the lab hardware packed up and palletized for the C-141 shipment. The ER-2 science teams have loaded C-141's for a number of other science missions, so they're very good at efficiently putting the pallets together.
We had a very nice meeting today of the GSFC people working on the SOLVE mission. Dave Lamich of the Data Assimilation Office DAO) first spoke on the meteorological assimilated fields and the forecast products provided by the GEOS-3 operational system. We use these meteorological fields (temperatures, winds, potential vorticity) to plan flights of the ER-2 and DC-8, and launches of our balloons. After Dave, Andrea Ledvina reported on her experiences during the first SOLVE deployment with the assimilation products. A couple of people remarked to me that Andrea did a great job up in Kiruna. Leslie Lait of Code 916 showed temperatures from the AROTEL lidar system alongside the temperatures from the GEOS-3 data assimilation. It appears that the lidar temperatures are colder than the assimilation temperatures in the 24-30 km region, but Leslie needs to do some further analysis on this discrepancy. After Leslie spoke, Larry Coy of Code 916 showed some interesting features in the PV fields we'd been using for flight planning. Finally, I stood up and explained what sorts of flights we would be performing during this coming January deployment, and how important the assimilation products and forecasts were to the mission's ultimate success. The DAO folks have done a great job for our stratospheric missions over the years!
Brian Toon forwarded out a belated discussion of the DC-8 flight of December 16, 1999 which I've added as an entry on 1999-12-17.
While I sit at GSFC nursing my fragile bone structure, Steve Hipskind is handling all of the problems out at Dryden. The ER-2 will transit to Kiruna, Sweden with a UHF and a VHF radio rather than our originally intentioned two VHF radios. The ER-2 will also carry the Iridium phone system and the ALE HF radio system. On Thursday (1/6) we will test the full payload and these 4 radios on a 5 hour test flight going southward. Steve reports:
We are still working to the schedule as posted on the SOLVE web site. The current plan is for a FIVE hour flight on Thursday with a 1300 local take off time. The crew will be in tomorrow (Wednesday), so if you have any issues which require access to the aircraft, we want to get them taken care of tomorrow. If you can upload and stay on the aircraft, we'd like get as much out of the way tomorrow as we can, and minimize the upload time on Thursday.Getting the ER-2 ready to fly is a carefully choreographed operation involving the instrument scientists, aircraft crew, pilots, meteorologists, and project scientists. Preparations for an ER-2 flight begins about 4 hours before takeoff with the loading of the instruments onto the plane. We usually load the nose first, followed by the Q-bay and E-bay, followed by the left superpod, and ending with the right superpod. While we usually give the pilots an informal briefing the day prior to a flight, the final briefing occurs 3 hours before takeoff as we're loading instruments onto the plane. At this meeting we go over the final details of the flight and discuss the weather conditions for takeoff and landing. If the weather situation looks promising, we continue our loading and finish things off about 2 hours before takeoff. After meeting 3 hours before the flight, the pilot will prepare and file a flight plan with the FAA or local aviation authorities. After we finish loading the aircraft, the crew will take the plane out of the hangar, fuel the plane, add liquid oxygen, and make general preparations for the flight. In addition, the "mobile pilot" will do the pre-flight of the aircraft. About 1 hour before the flight, the pilot will begin suiting up in his pressure suit, and will commence breathing his pure oxygen. Approximately 30 minutes before takeoff, the pilot will climb into the cockpit, strap in, start the engines, power on the instruments, and then takeoff. Takeoff is always fun, since many of the scientists will stand outside watching the ER-2 soar off of the runway.
A few problems were identified in Kiruna during the December DC-8 deployment. First and foremost is the lack of bathroom facilities!
The shipment of gas bottles from GSFC to Kiruna arrived at the Kiruna airport yesterday! While this may seem trivial to some people, after our computer shipment fiasco in late November, we're quite happy that the gas shipment worked great.
The ER-2 is being re-integrated after our short holiday break. The current plan is for a short test flight on Thursday (1/6), pack and load for a transit to Westover, MA on Sunday (1/9), with a transit to Kiruna, Sweden from Westover on Tuesday (1/11).
I've returned from my vacation with a cracked upper right arm as a result of a skiing crash.
Last Updated: 1999-11-23
Author:
Dr.
Paul A. Newman
(NASA/GSFC, Code 916) (newman@notus.gsfc.nasa.gov)
Web Curator: Dr. Leslie R. Lait (Raytheon ITSS) (lrlait@ertel.gsfc.nasa.gov)
Responsible NASA organization/official: Dr. Paul A. Newman, Atmospheric
Chemistry and Dynamics Branch
