Injection in the lower stratosphere of biomass fire emissions followed by long-range transport: a MOZAIC case study

Cammas, J. P.; Chaboureau, J.-P.; Mari, C.; Pätz, H.-W.; Stohl, A.; Fromm, M.; Volz-Thomas, A.; Nedelec, P.; Smit, H.; Mascart, P.; Duron, J.; Brioude, J.

Journal Article

Injection in the lower stratosphere of biomass fire emissions followed by long-range transport: a MOZAIC case study

Cammas, J. P. ; Brioude, J. ; Chaboureau, J.-P. ; Duron, J. ; Mari, C. ; Mascart, P. ; Nedelec, P. ; Smit, H.FZJ* ; Pätz, H.-W.FZJ* ; Volz-Thomas, A.FZJ* ; Stohl, A. ; Fromm, M.

2009
EGU Katlenburg-Lindau

Atmospheric chemistry and physics 9, 5829 - 5846 (2009)

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Please use a persistent id in citations: http://hdl.handle.net/2128/10135

Abstract: This paper analyses a stratospheric injection by deep convection of biomass fire emissions over North America (Alaska, Yukon and Northwest Territories) on 24 June 2004 and its long-range transport over the eastern coast of the United States and the eastern Atlantic. The case study is based on airborne MOZAIC observations of ozone, carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides and water vapour during the crossing of the southernmost tip of an upper level trough over the Eastern Atlantic on 30 June and on a vertical profile over Washington DC on 30 June, and on lidar observations of aerosol backscattering at Madison (University of Wisconsin) on 28 June. Attribution of the observed CO plumes to the boreal fires is achieved by backward simulations with a Lagrangian particle dispersion model (FLEXPART). A simulation with the Meso-NH model for the source region shows that a boundary layer tracer, mimicking the boreal forest fire smoke, is lofted into the lowermost stratosphere (2-5 pvu layer) during the diurnal convective cycle at isentropic levels (above 335 K) corresponding to those of the downstream MOZAIC observations. It is shown that the order of magnitude of the time needed by the parameterized convective detrainment flux to fill the volume of a model mesh (20 km horizontal, 500 m vertical) above the tropopause with pure boundary layer air would be about 7.5 h, i.e. a time period compatible with the convective diurnal cycle. Over the area of interest, the maximum instantaneous detrainment fluxes deposited about 15 to 20% of the initial boundary layer tracer concentration at 335 K. According to the 275-ppbv carbon monoxide maximum mixing ratio observed by MOZAIC over Eastern Atlantic, such detrainment fluxes would be associated with a 1.4-1.8 ppmv carbon monoxide mixing ratio in the boundary layer over the source region.

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Meteorology & Atmospheric Sciences

Note: The authors acknowledge for their strong support the European Communities, EADS, Airbus and the airlines (Lufthansa, Austrian, Air France) who carry free of charge the MOZAIC equipment and perform the maintenance since 1994. MOZAIC is presently funded by INSU-CNRS (France), Meteo-France, and Forschungszentrum (FZJ, Julich, Germany). The MOZAIC data based is supported by ETHER (CNES and INSU-CNRS). We acknowledge E. Eloranta at the University of Wisconsin lidar group for providing lidar free-access images and O. Cooper (NOAA, Boulder, USA) for the set up of the web pages of the FLEXPART simulations for the ICARTT experiment. Computer resources for the Meso-NH simulations were allocated by IDRIS (projects 005, 569, and 1076). GOES-10 observations come from by SATMOS (CNRS/Meteo-France) and SAA (NOAA).

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