Flights Reveal Intriguing Information About Ice Particles In Clouds

[phantom power]

In the clouds above Darwin, Australia, pilots guided by a team of international climate scientists are now one week into a series of carefully orchestrated flights to obtain key in situ data about tropical clouds. Preliminary results obtained from instrumentation on the Proteus --a space-age aircraft equipped with a suite of highly sophisticated sensors -- reveal superior images of ice crystals in high-altitude tropical cirrus clouds.

"These images, combined with data from other aircraft probes, will provide us with a complete data set of detailed information about ice clouds, particularly the numbers of small ice crystals--a parameter that is poorly known and of considerable importance for understanding how clouds affect radiation and climate," said Dr. Greg McFarquhar, one of many U.S. scientists involved in the effort and funded by the Department of Energy's Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Program.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/02/060206231419.htm