Lidar and sunphotometry observations on the long-range transport of smoke and dust events

摘要

The remote sensing techniques of Lidar and Sunphotometry are well suited for understanding the optical characteristics of aerosol layers aloft. Lidar has the ability to detect the complex vertical structure of the atmosphere and can therefore identify the existence and extent of aerosols that have undergone long-range transport. Inversion techniques applied to Sunphotometry data can extract information about the aerosol fine and coarse modes. As part of the REALM network (Regional East Atmospheric Lidar Mesonet), routine measurements are made with a vertically-pointing lidar at the Centre For Atmospheric Research Experiments (CARE). In addition, a CIMEL sunphotometer resides at CARE (part of AERONET) yielding an opportunity to achieve an optical climatology of aerosol activity over the site. Environment Canada's mobile lidar facility called RASCAL (Rapid Acqusition SCanning Aerosol Lidar), operating in zenith mode only, was also deployed to Western Canada during the months of March and April, 2005 to provide an opportunity to measure the long-range transport of trans-Pacific pollutants that impact the coastal areas of British Columbia frequently. During that time a long-range transport event was observed on 13-14 of March 2005. Further analysis has shown the event originated from North African dust storms during the period 28 February to 3 March. The optical coherency of these active and passive remote sensors will be presented, along with other supporting observations, for forest fire smoke plumes transported over CARE (in 2003) and the first documented case of Saharan dust to impact Western North America.