Latest status and future plans for airborne
campaign – NRC Convair-580
Mengistu Wolde (NRC Canada) & collaborators
2nd ESA EarthCARE Validation Workshop
25-28 May 2021 (online)
ESA UNCLASSIFIED – For ESA Official Use Only

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NRC Convair-580 – Major National
Facility for Atmospheric Research
Radars: X, Ka and W; Lidar: 355 nm AECL;
Radiometers: 183 GHz, HiSRAMS
In-situ: Atmospheric and Aircraft States, Aerosol,
cloud microphysics
NRC and ECCC in collaborations with many partners
has conducted many projects related to space based
earth observations: CloudSat and CALIPSO (C3VP); GPM (GCPEX) ESA proof-of-concept studies (2017-Present):
WIVERN (W-band PDPP), RadSnowExp, Raincast& HiSRAMS

Crew: 2 pilots + 10 project personnel
Endurance: 4 – 5 hours
Range: ~1000 km
Vertical ceiling: 23,000 ft (7000 m)

Jointly instrumented by NRC and ECCC
tinyurl.com/convair
2New instruments• SPEC HVPS-4 (2022)• NRC cIKP (2022)

HiSRAMS• HISRAMS (2021)• CVI inlet (2022)• Artium HSI (2021)
AERI

HSIConvair HSI imagery from HAIC-HIWC Campaign
Credit: W.D Bachalo –Artium3

Science Drivers: Measurements in Ice
Ice Water Content (IWC) determined from image data typically uses power laws relating maxdimension (Brown and Francis 1995) or projected area (Baker and Lawson 2006) to IWC.
Orthogonal views will significantly improve IWC accuracy.
V2D-S
H

HVPS-3 UND Citation during OLYMPEX Project

The SPEC HVPS-4: Dual Resolution with Four Orthogonal Views•A cooperative development and flight testing effort between SPEC and NCAR(NSF MRI award). Prototype probe is flight tested now on the SPEC Learjet.

•Three added channels H and V: 50 mm & 150 mm vs. previous design•Integration and flight test on NRC Convair-580 – Nov-Dec, 2021; Project use
Feb-March 2022
Credit: Paul Lawson – Spec inc.

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Ice habits carry history of cloud processes
Pristine plate

Capped column – change of conditions

Bullet rosette

Lollipops and multiplication

melting

Hollow column

dropletGraupel55

rain

aggregations

rimingConvolutional Neural Net CPI classification
A CNN toolbox for Convair-580 imaging
Classifies CPI images into labeled particle habits
Architecture
Multilayered Neural Network

complex processes and history morechallenging to classify, count, size,
QC of data

Quality
Using quality metrics, we achieve ~0.99 accuracy on both training and validation sets
Future developments
A similar toolbox is under development for other imaging probes

66Recent Airborne Projects – Proof-of-concept studies for space applications (2016-now)
Doppler Wind Radar
Demonstrator for WIVERNRadSnowExp/RainCast – Multi-platform High Spectral Resolution Airborne
Microwave Sounder - HiSRAMS& multiple frequency Radar study

Airborne Triple-frequency measurement ofArctic Clouds

The NRC Airborne W Radar is used tomeasure high Doppler Velocity (>100m/s) using Polarization Diversity Pulse
Pair (PDPP) technique – First suchmeasurement from a moving platform.
Reference:Illingworth et. al. (2018), Wolde et. al. (2019), Battaglia et. al. (2017)

C. Nguyen, M. Wolde, A. Battaglia,
et. al., 2021, “Triple-Frequency
Airborne Radar Observation ofArctic and Mid-latitude Clouds”,
Atmos. Meas. Tech, submitted•

Two compact dual-polarized radiometers at 60
GHz oxygen and 183 GHz water-vapor bands•

Spectral resolution up to 300 kHz (thousands ofchannels)•Zenith/nadir scanning capability• improved temperature and water vapor retrievalsin the troposphere7

Climate Sentinel Station in Ottawa (2022)
J. Gyakum et. al.

Courtesy of Paul Lebbin
Courtesy of Eve Bigras
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FAA TAIWIN Demonstration Activity
FAA Project Lead: Stephanie DiVito
Supporting PIs: Scott Landolt (NCAR); Ben Bernstein (LEA)

demonstration for a high-resolution terminal area icing capability under development
Winter 2021-2022: Collect data while running V1 of capability in real-time at select airports– NRC Convair-580 (Feb 2022)– Instrumented ground sites

Small drops

12,000 ft

FZDZ

60 nmi

May 2021

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WINTRE-MIX
WINter precip Type REsearch MultI-scale eXperiment(under review -NSF)

Goal:
To better understand how multi-scale
processes influence the variability andpredictability of precipitation type andamount under near-freezing surface
conditions.

Montreal

USA

Lake Champlain

CanadaTarget time frame:•1 February – 15 March 2022••

St. Lawrence / Champlain Valleys
US (NY) – CAN (QC) boarder

Target region:

US PIs:J. Minder, N. Bassill (UAlbany)
J. French, D. Kingsmill (UWyoming)
K. Friedrich, A. Winters (UColorado)

Canadian PIs :M. Wolde, Cuong Nguyen, Leonid Nichman (NRC)
J. Gyakum, D. Kirshbaum, F. Fabry (McGill)
J. Theriault (UQAM)
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https://worldview.earthdata.nasa.gov/

Aircraft campaigns• Extensive in-situ and remote sensing capabilities (ground and aircraft)• New and improved microphysical sensors for project use by 2022 on theNRC Convair-580• Strong interest to collaborate in pre-launch and post-launch campaigns

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Backup

ESA UNCLASSIFIED – For ESA Official Use Only12

In-situ and remote sensing instruments on NRC Convair-580
Measured Parameters
Aircraft state

Instrument
Inertial Navigation Systems (4), and GPS (2), Reverse Flow Temperature

Atmospheric state

Rosemount Temperature Sensors (4), Licors (2) – Dew point, Chilled Mirror, Multiple pressure transducers including 3- 5-hole probes

Aerosol

Wing mounted UHSAS, Cabin UHSAS, SP2, CCNcounter-100, CPC3776. optional(CPC3790, CN7610, LII300, SP2, APS)

Icing and icing type (Dither algorithm)

Goodrich Icing Detector (3)Bulk microphysical measurements (TWC, LWC)

2x Nevzorov(analog), SEA ICD, Nevzorov(digital)

Extinction

ECCC Extinction probe (CEP)

Cloud Particles (Size and concentrations)

2x CDP-2, FCDP, FSSPCloud drops - – shape, size and concentrations

2x 2DC; 2x 2DS; CIP-15, CIP-25, 2x HSI, CPI

Large Precipitation Particles – shape, size and concentration

PIP, HVPS-3, HVPS-4•
Cloud Structure, dynamics and composition – Radar Reflectivity, Doppler•NRC Airborne W (94.05 GHz) and X (9.41 GHz) (NAWX) band radars: 3 antennas (zenith, nadir, side) for each system, dual-polarization, dual-Doppler, Polarization
Diversity Pulse Pair capability. Ka-band (35.64 GHz) radar: 2 antennas.
Pilot X-band Radar

Brightness Temperature, temperature and water vapor profiles

HiSRAMS (Hyperspectral Radiometers at Oxygen band (60 GHz) and WV (183 GHz) ) – scanning, option for up or down looking.

Cloud Structure, and composition – Lidar backscatter

2x 355 nm, linearly polarizedLightning detection

Stormscope Goodrich WX-500

Flight logs / chats / track marking

Planet ; ground to air communication and chat – low band width link, but allow chat and some limited data broadcast from the aircraft and also receiving data from ground*not all the listed sensors can be installed at once
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