SURFRADCOMP

Surface Radiation Comparison Transfer Measurements for RACORO

20 January 2009 - 30 June 2009

Lead Scientist: Chuck Long

Observatory: SGP

The intent of the RACORO [Routine AAF Clouds with Low Optical Water Depths(CLOWD) Optical Radiative Observations] campaign was to gather statistics on the cloud, aerosol, and radiative properties of optically thin, low liquid water path cloud fields. The RACORO airborne observations, among other things, tested and refined ARM surface remote sensing capabilities. As such, an important aspect of RACORO was using radiative closure modeling, for which accurate radiation measurements were critical. The airborne radiometers were of different make and manufacture than those the ARM program deploys at the surface, and were additionally modified for aircraft use. A set of the aircraft-style radiometers were directly compared to the aircraft mounted radiometers before and after the RACORO campaign, and deployed at the ARM SGP central facility during the campaign, as a means of relating the possibly differing performance and characteristics of the two sets (airborne and ARM surface) of radiation measurements. Thus as a result the airborne and surface radiation measurements were tied together to better enhance their usefulness for radiative closure efforts.