the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
| 15 Sep 2023
Monitoring biomass burning aerosol transport using CALIOP observations and reanalysis models: a Canadian wildfire event in 2019
Abstract. In May–June 2019, smoke plumes from wildfires in Alberta, Canada, were advected all the way to Europe. To analyze the evolution of the plumes and to estimate the amount of smoke aerosols transported to Europe, retrievals from the space-borne lidar CALIOP (Cloud-Aerosol Lidar with Orthogonal Polarization) were used. The plumes were located with the help of a trajectory analysis, and the mass of smoke aerosols were retrieved from the CALIOP observations. The accuracy of the CALIOP mass retrievals was compared with the accuracy of ground-based lidars/ceilometer near the source in North America and after the long-range transport in Europe. Overall, CALIOP and the ground-based lidars/ceilometer produced comparable results. Over North America the CALIOP layer mean mass was 30 % smaller than the ground-based estimates, whereas over Southern Europe that difference varied between 12 % and 43 %. Finally, the CALIOP mass retrievals were compared with simulated aerosol concentrations from two reanalysis models, MERRA-2 (Modern-Era Retrospective analysis for Research and Applications, Version 2) and CAMS (Copernicus Atmospheric Monitoring System). The simulated total column aerosol optical depths (AOD) and the total column mass concentration of smoke agreed quite well with CALIOP observations, but the comparison of the layer mass concentration of smoke showed significant discrepancies. The amount of smoke aerosols in the model simulations was consistently smaller than in the CALIOP retrievals. These results highlight the limitations of such models, and more specifically their limitation to reproduce properly the smoke vertical distribution. They indicate that CALIOP is a useful tool monitoring smoke plumes over secluded areas whereas reanalysis models have difficulties in representing the aerosol mass in these plumes. This study shows the advantages of space-borne aerosol lidars, e.g. being of paramount importance to monitor smoke plumes, and reveals the urgent need of future lidar missions in space.
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Notice on discussion status
The requested preprint has a corresponding peer-reviewed final revised paper. You are encouraged to refer to the final revised version.
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Preprint
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The requested preprint has a corresponding peer-reviewed final revised paper. You are encouraged to refer to the final revised version.
- Preprint
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- Final revised paper
Journal article(s) based on this preprint
Interactive discussion
Status: closed
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RC1: 'Comment on egusphere-2023-1945', Anonymous Referee #1, 15 Oct 2023
- AC1: 'Reply on RC1', Xiaoxia Shang, 18 Dec 2023
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RC2: 'Comment on egusphere-2023-1945', Anonymous Referee #2, 21 Nov 2023
This is a very interesting study that attempts to investigate an aerosol transport event from different perspectives – perhaps, from almost all possible angles: ground, space, and models.
My main concern is that, in general, the authors should have addressed the possible uncertainties in detail, such as temporal/spatial collocation mismatches, lidar ratio assumptions, and assumptions in the trajectory model. Perhaps it would be helpful to have dedicated sections discussing these uncertainties. I don't mean to suggest that the authors are unaware of these uncertainties. In fact, the later part of the manuscript mentions that future lidar missions/studies would be important. However, that message could be strengthened by a dedicated section on uncertainties.
Additionally, I do not quite understand how you derived these trajectory frequencies. I suggest refining Section 2.4.2.
While I am not an expert in writing, I feel that this manuscript may not be easily readable. Considering that it's a good study with nice ideas on combining different perspectives, I wish the writing also matched that high standard.
Corrections:
Line 49: “…vastness of the boreal region; it cannot be covered with advanced ground-based…” (added a ';', removed the second 'based')Line 79: works -> studies
Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2023-1945-RC2 - AC2: 'Reply on RC2', Xiaoxia Shang, 18 Dec 2023
Interactive discussion
Status: closed
-
RC1: 'Comment on egusphere-2023-1945', Anonymous Referee #1, 15 Oct 2023
- AC1: 'Reply on RC1', Xiaoxia Shang, 18 Dec 2023
-
RC2: 'Comment on egusphere-2023-1945', Anonymous Referee #2, 21 Nov 2023
This is a very interesting study that attempts to investigate an aerosol transport event from different perspectives – perhaps, from almost all possible angles: ground, space, and models.
My main concern is that, in general, the authors should have addressed the possible uncertainties in detail, such as temporal/spatial collocation mismatches, lidar ratio assumptions, and assumptions in the trajectory model. Perhaps it would be helpful to have dedicated sections discussing these uncertainties. I don't mean to suggest that the authors are unaware of these uncertainties. In fact, the later part of the manuscript mentions that future lidar missions/studies would be important. However, that message could be strengthened by a dedicated section on uncertainties.
Additionally, I do not quite understand how you derived these trajectory frequencies. I suggest refining Section 2.4.2.
While I am not an expert in writing, I feel that this manuscript may not be easily readable. Considering that it's a good study with nice ideas on combining different perspectives, I wish the writing also matched that high standard.
Corrections:
Line 49: “…vastness of the boreal region; it cannot be covered with advanced ground-based…” (added a ';', removed the second 'based')Line 79: works -> studies
Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2023-1945-RC2 - AC2: 'Reply on RC2', Xiaoxia Shang, 18 Dec 2023
Peer review completion
Journal article(s) based on this preprint
Data sets
CALIPSO data NASA Langley Research Center Atmospheric Science Data Center https://subset.larc.nasa.gov/calipso/
MERRA-2 data NASA Goddard Earth Sciences (GES) Data and Information Services Center (DISC) https://disc.gsfc.nasa.gov/datasets?project=MERRA-2
CAMS data Atmosphere Data Store https://ads.atmosphere.copernicus.eu/
MPLNET data MPLNET https://mplnet.gsfc.nasa.gov/download_tool/
Visualization of lidar products of PollyNet PollyNet https://polly.tropos.de/
Ceilometer data Cloudnet https://cloudnet.fmi.fi/
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Cited
1 citations as recorded by crossref.
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Mika Komppula
Tero Mielonen
The requested preprint has a corresponding peer-reviewed final revised paper. You are encouraged to refer to the final revised version.
- Preprint
(7576 KB) - Metadata XML