NASA06: 20060210a
Pilot: Kevin Fagerstrom
Right Seat: Bart Geerts
Third Seat: Jonathon Wolfe
Fourth Seat: Jeff French
Pre-flight:
Instruments:
This is the last flight of NASA06, before flight all aerosol gear was removed, the second (new) FSSP was mounted
Weather conditions:
Winds out of the Northwest, shallow clouds over the Snowy Range and Laramie Range, extend up to ~13 kft, clouds look somewhat convective in nature, but capped by strong inversion??
Flight:
~1915 wheels up
1921 open Nadir port
1932 @ 13 kft towards west end of valley to do NW-SE pass over Glees at 14 kft…we appear to be ~1500 to 2000 ft above cloud top with only a few ‘turrets’ (I use this term loosely) extending to our altitude
1937 wind: 331 deg @ 27-30 kts
1938 clip cloud top
194330 on south end of Snowy Range clipping tops, all probes show some liquid water, lwcs up to ~0.2 g/m3, also shows up in both FSSPs
1947 turn east, proceed to Laramie Range, descend to 11 kft
1956 checked Cheyenne radar, strongest echoes extend to north and east of Cheyenne, some also along the Laramie range, north and west of Cheyenne, no apparent banded structure as was seen on NWS radar pre-flight
1958-2007 NW to SE track along Laramie Range, ‘spotty clouds’ with liquid water up to 0.2 g m3, FSSP spectra in good agreement re: size, all d’s < 20 um, new FSSP has 2x concentration of old FSSP
200930 complete turn at SE end of leg, set up for SE-NW leg
2030 end of 2nd leg, begin 3rd NW to SE
2033 over ridge on NW end, liquid water up to 0.35 g/m3, all small drops
2042 south end of leg turn for next leg
2057 end of leg, set up to go south, will proceed ~1/2 of leg then turn to Wolfe’s hotplate site
210930 over Wolfe’s site, severe clear, east of precip/clouds over Laramie Range, west of precip lying north and east of Cheyenne
2115 set up for cross wind leg over Laramie Range
2127 preparation for landing, we shutdown WASP, closed Nadir port, pull DMT breakers just before landing
Post flight:
All instruments looked good in flight. New FSSP concs 2X concs from old FSSP, PVM LWCs twice as large as DMT