ACTOS – a rising television star
In the morning on the way
to the airport we were welcomed by a light drizzle from a
stratocumulus. It was a full cloud cover of the sky but as it was
forecasted, we were counting on that the clouds will brake later.
Hands off at 10:30, everything and everyone are ready and then... no,
we coudn't fly at 11:00, a cloud base was too low. We had to postpone
the flight until 13:30.
Taking photos isn't so easy |
In the meanwhile, on the
airport came a cameraman. It turned out that a Portuguese television
got interested in our studies (or more precisely, in us)! Karine, as
the only one among us speaking Portuguese, gave an interview and
there is a chance that we will be even on a national TV.
Finally, a take-off took
place at 13:39. At first, we did a vertical profile up to 7000 ft,
going further and further from the island. The first thin cloud layer
appeared at 300 m. An inversion of about 3 K/100 m was located at
1200 m. Apart from an increase of particles above the cloud, there
was also a slight increase inside it!
Our Stratocumulus with a tempting Cumulus in the background |
Afterwards we turned over
and did 3 dolphin flights from above the inversion to below it, each
on the same route. A cloud top was very well determined, the edge was
sharp, in contrast to its bottom. LWC was reaching 0.4 g/m^3.
Then, we did 4 horizontal
legs: one above the stratocumuli, 2 inside them (although the second
one was less dense, with LWC only 0.25 g/m^3), and the last one below
them. We were keeping the same cloud group for a whole time and we
omitted cumuli above Graciosa though they were tempting – the only
clouds we measured were Sc. An interesting fact, above the clouds
there were some layers with different and rather constant particle
concentration. A landing was smooth.
This rock is supposed to look like a whale |
As the G1 is flying
tomorrow in the morning, we're having a briefing at 12, so we can
sleep a bit longer.
Juergen, Alwin and Birgit
– thanks for the flight!
posted by Dominika
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