May 18 case

Description

  • Shallow cumulus day, no precipitation
  • G1 sampled from 1100 to 1451 LT

Central Facility sounding

Early morning

  • CAPE: 0.0 J/kg, CIN: 0.0 J/kg, LCL: 972.42 hPa, LFC: NA
  • Strong inversion at 900 hPa level, and generally stable layer between ~850 and 650 hPa
  • Moist boundary layer and dry layer between 800 and 700 hPa level
  • 5-10 kts (2.5-5 m/s) winds from west in the PBL/lower levels

Around noon

  • CAPE: 25.8 J/kg, CIN: 0.0 J/kg, LCL: 867.38 hPa, LFC: 867.38 hPa
  • Low-level dry layer (800-700 hPa) still remain; a surface parcel has negligible CAPE
  • Still calm wind within and right above the PBL, up to ~ 3 m/s

CTP-HIlow diagram

CTP-HIlow diagram review

  • Most of the ERA5 grid columns within the outer domain shows that PBL is sufficiently moist to initiate convection (HIlow between 5 and 5 K) but only shallow convection is likely due to stable condition in the lower troposphere (negative CTP).

MODIS Terra image and G1 flight routes

GOES visible reflectance snap shots from late morning to afternoon

GOES visible reflectance comparison from late morning to afternoon

Inner-domain average of short-wave reflectance from WRF (ratio of SWUPT/SWDNT) and GOES (post-processed to 5-km grid over SGP)

  • Fraction of non-missing data across the inner domain

  • Inner-domain average SW reflectance

GOES vs WRF timeseries comparison from late morning to afternoon

Inner-domain average of short-wave reflectance

Comparing WRF (ratio of SWUPT/SWDNT) and GOES (post-processed to 5-km grid over SGP)

  • Fraction of non-missing data across the inner domain

  • Inner-domain average SW reflectance

Inner-domain average Liquid Water Path

  • Fraction of non-missing data across the inner domain

  • Inner-domain average LWP

  • Inner-domain average cloud fraction (fraction of grid columns with LWP > 1.0 g/m2)