the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
28 Jan 2021
28 Jan 2021
EUREC4A
- 1Max Planck Institute for Meteorology, Hamburg, Germany
- 2LMD/IPSL, Sorbonne Université, CNRS, Paris, France
- 3Caribbean Institute for Meteorology and Hydrology, Barbados
- 4Universität Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany
- 5National Centre for Atmospheric Science, University of Leeds, UK
- 6NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory, Boulder, CO, USA
- 7GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, Kiel, Germany
- 8NOAA PMEL, Seattle, WA, USA
- 9LMD/IPSL, École Normale Supérieure, CNRS, Paris, France
- 10Institute for Geophysics and Meteorology, University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany
- 11Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science, ETH Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
- 12Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization, Göttingen, Germany
- 13Cooperative Institute for Research In Environmental Sciences, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO, USA
- 14LATMOS/IPSL, Université Paris-Saclay, UVSQ, Guyancourt, France
- 15University of Leeds, Leeds, UK
- 16Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt, Oberpfaffenhofen, Germany
- 17Centre for Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences, School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK
- 18DWD Hans-Ertel-Zentrum für Wetterforschung, Offenbach, Germany
- 19Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität in Munich, Munich, Germany
- 20Laboratoire d’Aérologie, University of Toulouse, CNRS, Toulouse, France
- 21Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology, Bremen, Germany
- 22Meteorological Institute, Center for Earth System Research and Sustainability, Universität Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany
- 23Delft University of Technology, Delft, The Netherlands
- 24Sorbonne Université, CNRS, IRD, MNHN, UMR7159 LOCEAN/IPSL, Paris, France
- 25Max Planck Institute for Chemistry, Mainz, Germany
- 26CNRM, University of Toulouse, Météo-France, CNRS, Toulouse, France
- 27Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California San Diego, San Diego, CA, USA
- 28National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, CO, USA
- 29University of Miami, Miami, FL, USA
- 30Hydrometeorological Service, Guyana
- 31Institute of Marine Affairs, Trinidad and Tobago
- 32Institute of Geophysics, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland
- 33LSCE/IPSL, CNRS-CEA-UVSQ, University Paris-Saclay, Gif sur Yvette, France
- 34Met Office, Exeter, UK
- 35Frédéric Batier Photography, Berlin, Germany
- 36Institute of Physics and Meteorology, University of Hohenheim, Stuttgart, Germany
- 37Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Woods Hole, MA, USA
- 38Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Barbados
- 39Department of Atmospheric Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA
- 40IPGP, Paris, France
- 41ENSTA Bretagne, Lab-STICC, CNRS, Brest, France
- 42Aix Marseille Université, Université de Toulon, CNRS, IRD, MIO UM 110, Marseille, France
- 43University of Manchester, Manchester, UK
- 44Ifremer, Brest, France
- 45Irphe, CNRS/Amu/Ecm, Marseille, France
- 46University of Warsaw, Warsaw, Poland
- 47NOAA Chemical Sciences Laboratory, Boulder, CO, USA
- 48St. Christopher Air & Sea Ports Authority, Basseterre, St. Kitts and Nevis
- 49SAFIRE, Météo-France, CNRS, CNES, Cugnaux, France
- 50LOPS/IUEM, Université de Bretagne Occidentale, CNRS, Brest, France
- 51Argyle Meteorological Services, St. Vincent & The Grenadines
- 52Grenada Meteorological Services, Grenada
- 53University of California Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz, CA, USA
- 54Cayman Islands National Weather Service, Cayman Islands
- 55LOA, Univ. Lille, CNRS, Lille, France
- 56LAMP, Université Clermont Auvergne, CNRS, Clermont-Ferrand, France
- 57Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA
- 58Leibniz Institute for Tropospheric Research, Leipzig, Germany
- 59IPSL, CNRS, Paris, France
- 60Applied Physics Laboratory, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA
- 61Department of Earth and Space Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA
- 62Department of Meteorology and Geophysics, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria
- 63Leipzig Institute for Meteorology, University of Leipzig, Germany
- 64Meteorological Department St. Maarten
- 65Gemma Center, University of Milano-Bicocca, Milan, Italy
- 66LATMOS/IPSL, Sorbonne Université, CNRS, Paris, France
- 67NOAA Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory, Miami, FL, USA
- 68Compania Fortuna, Sucy en Brie, France
- 69Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM USA
- 70Farallon Institute, USA
- 71DT-INSU, CNRS, France
- 72Barbados Coast Guard, Barbados
- 73The University of the West Indies, Cave Hill Campus Barbados, Barbados
- 74Regional Security System, Barbados
- 75College of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR, USA
- 76NOAA Earth System Research Laboratory, Boulder, CO, USA
- 77LOPS, Université de Bretagne Occidentale, Brest, France
- 78British Antarctic Survey, Cambridge, UK
- 79Caribbean Meteorological Organization, Trinidad and Tobago
- 80IPSL, Paris, France
- 81Center for Ocean-Atmospheric Prediction Studies, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL, USA
- 82Milano Bicocca University, Italy
- 83Trinidad and Tobago Meteorological Services, Trinidad and Tobago
- 84OSU Pytheas, Marseille, France
- 85The Institute of Oceanology, Polish Academy of Sciences, Sopot, Poland
- 86National Observatory of Athens, Athens, Greece
- 87Dronexsolution, Toulouse, France
- 88Barbados Meteorological Services, Barbados
- 89Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, UCLA, Los Angeles, CA, USA
- 90CIMA Research Foundation, Savona, Italy
- 91University of Auckland, Auckland, NZ
- 92Meteorological Service, Kingston, Jamaica
- 93Sorbonne Université, CNRS, IRD, MNHN, INRAE, ENS, UMS 3455, OSU Ecce Terra, Paris, France
- 94LEGOS, University of Toulouse, IRD, CNRS, CNES, UPS, Toulouse, France
- 95University of Southern Queensland, Toowoomba, Australia
- 96University of Connecticut Avery Point, Groton, CT, USA
- 97European Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasts, Reading, UK
- 98Naval Research Laboratory, Monterey, CA, USA
- 99Science Systems and Applications, Inc., Lanham, Maryland, USA
- 100University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, USA
- 101Department of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Science, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL, USA
- 102National Meteorological Service of Belize, Belize
- 103Cooperative Institute for Climate, Ocean, and Ecosystem Studies, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA
- 104Deutsches Klimarechenzentrum GmbH, Hamburg, Germany
- 1Max Planck Institute for Meteorology, Hamburg, Germany
- 2LMD/IPSL, Sorbonne Université, CNRS, Paris, France
- 3Caribbean Institute for Meteorology and Hydrology, Barbados
- 4Universität Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany
- 5National Centre for Atmospheric Science, University of Leeds, UK
- 6NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory, Boulder, CO, USA
- 7GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, Kiel, Germany
- 8NOAA PMEL, Seattle, WA, USA
- 9LMD/IPSL, École Normale Supérieure, CNRS, Paris, France
- 10Institute for Geophysics and Meteorology, University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany
- 11Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science, ETH Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
- 12Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization, Göttingen, Germany
- 13Cooperative Institute for Research In Environmental Sciences, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO, USA
- 14LATMOS/IPSL, Université Paris-Saclay, UVSQ, Guyancourt, France
- 15University of Leeds, Leeds, UK
- 16Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt, Oberpfaffenhofen, Germany
- 17Centre for Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences, School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK
- 18DWD Hans-Ertel-Zentrum für Wetterforschung, Offenbach, Germany
- 19Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität in Munich, Munich, Germany
- 20Laboratoire d’Aérologie, University of Toulouse, CNRS, Toulouse, France
- 21Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology, Bremen, Germany
- 22Meteorological Institute, Center for Earth System Research and Sustainability, Universität Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany
- 23Delft University of Technology, Delft, The Netherlands
- 24Sorbonne Université, CNRS, IRD, MNHN, UMR7159 LOCEAN/IPSL, Paris, France
- 25Max Planck Institute for Chemistry, Mainz, Germany
- 26CNRM, University of Toulouse, Météo-France, CNRS, Toulouse, France
- 27Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California San Diego, San Diego, CA, USA
- 28National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, CO, USA
- 29University of Miami, Miami, FL, USA
- 30Hydrometeorological Service, Guyana
- 31Institute of Marine Affairs, Trinidad and Tobago
- 32Institute of Geophysics, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland
- 33LSCE/IPSL, CNRS-CEA-UVSQ, University Paris-Saclay, Gif sur Yvette, France
- 34Met Office, Exeter, UK
- 35Frédéric Batier Photography, Berlin, Germany
- 36Institute of Physics and Meteorology, University of Hohenheim, Stuttgart, Germany
- 37Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Woods Hole, MA, USA
- 38Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Barbados
- 39Department of Atmospheric Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA
- 40IPGP, Paris, France
- 41ENSTA Bretagne, Lab-STICC, CNRS, Brest, France
- 42Aix Marseille Université, Université de Toulon, CNRS, IRD, MIO UM 110, Marseille, France
- 43University of Manchester, Manchester, UK
- 44Ifremer, Brest, France
- 45Irphe, CNRS/Amu/Ecm, Marseille, France
- 46University of Warsaw, Warsaw, Poland
- 47NOAA Chemical Sciences Laboratory, Boulder, CO, USA
- 48St. Christopher Air & Sea Ports Authority, Basseterre, St. Kitts and Nevis
- 49SAFIRE, Météo-France, CNRS, CNES, Cugnaux, France
- 50LOPS/IUEM, Université de Bretagne Occidentale, CNRS, Brest, France
- 51Argyle Meteorological Services, St. Vincent & The Grenadines
- 52Grenada Meteorological Services, Grenada
- 53University of California Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz, CA, USA
- 54Cayman Islands National Weather Service, Cayman Islands
- 55LOA, Univ. Lille, CNRS, Lille, France
- 56LAMP, Université Clermont Auvergne, CNRS, Clermont-Ferrand, France
- 57Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA
- 58Leibniz Institute for Tropospheric Research, Leipzig, Germany
- 59IPSL, CNRS, Paris, France
- 60Applied Physics Laboratory, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA
- 61Department of Earth and Space Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA
- 62Department of Meteorology and Geophysics, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria
- 63Leipzig Institute for Meteorology, University of Leipzig, Germany
- 64Meteorological Department St. Maarten
- 65Gemma Center, University of Milano-Bicocca, Milan, Italy
- 66LATMOS/IPSL, Sorbonne Université, CNRS, Paris, France
- 67NOAA Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory, Miami, FL, USA
- 68Compania Fortuna, Sucy en Brie, France
- 69Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM USA
- 70Farallon Institute, USA
- 71DT-INSU, CNRS, France
- 72Barbados Coast Guard, Barbados
- 73The University of the West Indies, Cave Hill Campus Barbados, Barbados
- 74Regional Security System, Barbados
- 75College of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR, USA
- 76NOAA Earth System Research Laboratory, Boulder, CO, USA
- 77LOPS, Université de Bretagne Occidentale, Brest, France
- 78British Antarctic Survey, Cambridge, UK
- 79Caribbean Meteorological Organization, Trinidad and Tobago
- 80IPSL, Paris, France
- 81Center for Ocean-Atmospheric Prediction Studies, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL, USA
- 82Milano Bicocca University, Italy
- 83Trinidad and Tobago Meteorological Services, Trinidad and Tobago
- 84OSU Pytheas, Marseille, France
- 85The Institute of Oceanology, Polish Academy of Sciences, Sopot, Poland
- 86National Observatory of Athens, Athens, Greece
- 87Dronexsolution, Toulouse, France
- 88Barbados Meteorological Services, Barbados
- 89Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, UCLA, Los Angeles, CA, USA
- 90CIMA Research Foundation, Savona, Italy
- 91University of Auckland, Auckland, NZ
- 92Meteorological Service, Kingston, Jamaica
- 93Sorbonne Université, CNRS, IRD, MNHN, INRAE, ENS, UMS 3455, OSU Ecce Terra, Paris, France
- 94LEGOS, University of Toulouse, IRD, CNRS, CNES, UPS, Toulouse, France
- 95University of Southern Queensland, Toowoomba, Australia
- 96University of Connecticut Avery Point, Groton, CT, USA
- 97European Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasts, Reading, UK
- 98Naval Research Laboratory, Monterey, CA, USA
- 99Science Systems and Applications, Inc., Lanham, Maryland, USA
- 100University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, USA
- 101Department of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Science, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL, USA
- 102National Meteorological Service of Belize, Belize
- 103Cooperative Institute for Climate, Ocean, and Ecosystem Studies, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA
- 104Deutsches Klimarechenzentrum GmbH, Hamburg, Germany
Abstract. The science guiding the EUREC4A campaign and its measurements are presented. EUREC4A comprised roughly five weeks of measurements in the downstream winter trades of the North Atlantic – eastward and south-eastward of Barbados. Through its ability to characterize processes operating across a wide range of scales, EUREC4A marked a turning point in our ability to observationally study factors influencing clouds in the trades, how they will respond to warming, and their link to other components of the earth system, such as upper-ocean processes or, or the life-cycle of particulate matter. This characterization was made possible by thousands (2500) of sondes distributed to measure circulations on meso (200 km) and larger (500 km) scales, roughly four hundred hours of flight time by four heavily instrumented research aircraft, four global-ocean class research vessels, an advanced ground-based cloud observatory, a flotilla of autonomous or tethered measurement devices operating in the upper ocean (nearly 10000 profiles), lower atmosphere (continuous profiling), and along the air-sea interface, a network of water stable isotopologue measurements, complemented by special programmes of satellite remote sensing and modeling with a new generation of weather/climate models. In addition to providing an outline of the novel measurements and their composition into a unified and coordinated campaign, the six distinct scientific facets that EUREC4A explored – from Brazil Ring Current Eddies to turbulence induced clustering of cloud droplets and its influence on warm-rain formation – are presented along with an overview EUREC4A's outreach activities, environmental impact, and guidelines for scientific practice.
Bjorn Stevens et al.
Interactive discussion
Status: closed
-
RC1: 'Comment on essd-2021-18', Anonymous Referee #1, 02 Mar 2021
General comments
This paper is a comprehensive review of the data collected during EUREC4A, which was conducted in the Atlantic trade wind region near Barbados in January-February 2020. The goal of the EUREC4A was to observe the atmosphere and ocean on multiple time and space scales using a large array of ocean and atmosphere instrumentation in order to better constrain environmental controls on trade wind cloud fields. It is anticipated that the experiment will lead to an improved understanding of how global warming might influence such clouds and their climate impacts.
EURIC4A was a massive, complex field campaign involving many measurement systems and numerous investigators from many nations. As such, undertaking a review of the measurement systems and data collected is daunting, but the authors have successfully created a readable, interesting, and comprehensible narrative. The paper contains lucid and pertinent graphics of the data collected, showing both some preliminary results and evidence of how the measurements link together to address the common goal of the paper. It is a credit to the project lead scientists to include all participants as co-authors of the paper. This is one of the best papers on field campaign data that I have read.
Specific comments
I have only minor comments.
- What are the impacts of Barbados island on measurements taken on and near the island? Data from the lidar on the island show a prominent diurnal cycle. Can you comment on the issue of representativeness of those island observations with respect to open-ocean conditions? Also, with the 300 m+ Barbados terrain, there may be some blocking effects on the flow upstream of the barrier that would influence observations there.
- Figure 12 shows that about half the campaign had elevated background concentrations of aerosols, presumably from African dust. The rest of the period had more-typical open-ocean concentrations, which would argue that for those times EURIC4A results might be transferrable to other ocean basins. The rapid ramp-ups and ramp-downs in February suggest there may sharp horizontal gradients in aerosols over the domain. While the variability offers the opportunity to investigate aerosol impacts on warm-rain formation, it may also present analysis challenges owing to large horizontal and vertical variations in CCN concentrations.
- Figure 17 figure shows a diurnal cycle of the SST. Will the data collected in EURIC4A be sufficient for a thorough analysis of effects of the radiation diurnal cycle on the cloud fields?
- Data policy on p. 38: “To actively support the initial dispersal of data by making (even preliminary) data available to everyone as quickly as possible through the AERIS archive.” Is it possible to be more specific about timing on data release?
Technical comments
- 16: In Fig. 8, define S and “black dashed line shows.”
- 23: Explain in caption the arrow in the upper panel and the vertical gray lines in the lower panels.
- 24, line 360: “The latter is the focus of the zoom in the lower panels of Fig. 13…”
- 29, Fig. 17: Define p in the caption.
- 38, line 585: Word missing after “resultant”
-
AC1: 'Reply on RC1', Bjorn Stevens, 14 May 2021
We thank the reviewer for their encouraging comments, and suggestions for improvement. We have addressed all the rcomments as suggested. On the more substantial points:
- We have analyzed the diurnal cycle over the BCO at the surface and at 400 me and compared these to near surface measurements from the Meteor. A diurnal cycle is evident in both locations, and is similar but substantially more pronounced (1.27 K vs 0.53 K) at the BCO. This is now discussed in the manuscript.
- We analyzed the 3hr changes in Ragged Point CCN measurements. These are usually less than 10%, and 80% of the time less than 30%. Given the much larger changes over periods of day and that an analysis period roughly corresponds to the 3hr period of the ATR, Twin-Otter and HALO circling, this is encouraging for the utility of the data for exploring aerosol-cloud interactions
The other minor comments were addressed by discussing the adequacy of the measurements for measuring the diel cycle and addressing the data availability quesiton -- most data is already available. Technical comments were addressed as suggested.
-
RC2: 'Comment on essd-2021-18', Anonymous Referee #2, 18 Mar 2021
General comments
The paper presents an overview of goals, design, the proceeding and first outcomes of EUREC4A project conducted in January and February 2020 in the vicinity of Barbados island on Atlantic trade winds region. Observations merged measurements conducted in the atmosphere (trade wind clouds) and in the ocean in wide span of time and space scales. The ultimate goal of the campaign was to improving our understanding of how the global warming could affect the trade wind clouds.
EUREC4A was undoubtedly the more complex and exhaustive observation campaign conducted ever. It is not common to review a paper describing such a complex experiment, probably because it is the first publication that engages with the challenge to present in a concise way such diverse measurements. Being specialist on atmospheric physics I won’t pretend that I understood all subtleties of ocean measurements. However, the paper offers a fluent narrative that allows even a non-specialist to catch the main ideas of observations performed. Still, I have few suggestions that could improve the overall understanding of the project (see below).
Specific comments:
Figures give a general overview of a kind of measurements performed during the experiment. Very often they are very complex and I think that they deserve more descriptions. I understand that those figures should give only an overview of what was observed, however a huge diversity of data make it difficult to understand for non-specialists (as atmospheric scientists versus oceanic scientists). I would appreciate if more attention is given to explain in some general yet concise manner what message could be inferred from those measurements.
Technical remarks:
p.4 Abstract, line 5; ‘or’ used twice.
p.5 l. 30: ‘to RICO’ should be probably ‘and RICO’
Figure 2, what is really shown in this figure? Is it a composition of all flights, dropsondes patterns, radiosonde soundings from the whole experiment? Colors in the figure don’t correspond exactly to the colors in the legend…. Or it is only me that cannot see correctly.
Figure 8, the scale for the isentropic lapse rate is missing, or I cannot see where it is. Or the dashed line does not represent a lapse rate?
p. 18, l. 268-269: ‘eighteen coordinated (4h flight segments)’ …. Should ‘segments’ be outside the parantheses?
Figure 11 deserves a legend more ‘compatible’ with descriptions in different parts of the figure. For instance: in the figure we see ‘CloudKite hologram’ that is described as MPCK+ in the legend.
p. 22 l 329: Prospero and Carlson, 2020, NOT ‘J M Prospero….’
p. 35 l. 535: ‘Holland’ should be ‘The Netherlands’
-
AC2: 'Comment on essd-2021-18', Bjorn Stevens, 14 May 2021
We have substantially addressed all of the comments in this reviews, as was suggested. The major change has been to revise most figures and figure captions to more consistently adhere to standards (also for names, and distinguishing between quantites such as height, altitude and depth), clarify figure elements, changing colors to make some aspects more clear, and to strengthen the description of the figure in the captions.
The one comment where there is a slight chance we misunderstood the reviewer comment, or did not address it adquately was on the laspe rate for the composite boundary layer figure, Fig 8. The dashed line is constant as the lifted parcel is unsaturated and then Θ increases after it ascends beyond the LCL. Originally we desribed the dashline as denoting the lapse rate, which is incorrect, what it describes is the potential temperature along an isentrope of near-surface air. If this was the point of confusion, it has been corrected.
Interactive discussion
Status: closed
-
RC1: 'Comment on essd-2021-18', Anonymous Referee #1, 02 Mar 2021
General comments
This paper is a comprehensive review of the data collected during EUREC4A, which was conducted in the Atlantic trade wind region near Barbados in January-February 2020. The goal of the EUREC4A was to observe the atmosphere and ocean on multiple time and space scales using a large array of ocean and atmosphere instrumentation in order to better constrain environmental controls on trade wind cloud fields. It is anticipated that the experiment will lead to an improved understanding of how global warming might influence such clouds and their climate impacts.
EURIC4A was a massive, complex field campaign involving many measurement systems and numerous investigators from many nations. As such, undertaking a review of the measurement systems and data collected is daunting, but the authors have successfully created a readable, interesting, and comprehensible narrative. The paper contains lucid and pertinent graphics of the data collected, showing both some preliminary results and evidence of how the measurements link together to address the common goal of the paper. It is a credit to the project lead scientists to include all participants as co-authors of the paper. This is one of the best papers on field campaign data that I have read.
Specific comments
I have only minor comments.
- What are the impacts of Barbados island on measurements taken on and near the island? Data from the lidar on the island show a prominent diurnal cycle. Can you comment on the issue of representativeness of those island observations with respect to open-ocean conditions? Also, with the 300 m+ Barbados terrain, there may be some blocking effects on the flow upstream of the barrier that would influence observations there.
- Figure 12 shows that about half the campaign had elevated background concentrations of aerosols, presumably from African dust. The rest of the period had more-typical open-ocean concentrations, which would argue that for those times EURIC4A results might be transferrable to other ocean basins. The rapid ramp-ups and ramp-downs in February suggest there may sharp horizontal gradients in aerosols over the domain. While the variability offers the opportunity to investigate aerosol impacts on warm-rain formation, it may also present analysis challenges owing to large horizontal and vertical variations in CCN concentrations.
- Figure 17 figure shows a diurnal cycle of the SST. Will the data collected in EURIC4A be sufficient for a thorough analysis of effects of the radiation diurnal cycle on the cloud fields?
- Data policy on p. 38: “To actively support the initial dispersal of data by making (even preliminary) data available to everyone as quickly as possible through the AERIS archive.” Is it possible to be more specific about timing on data release?
Technical comments
- 16: In Fig. 8, define S and “black dashed line shows.”
- 23: Explain in caption the arrow in the upper panel and the vertical gray lines in the lower panels.
- 24, line 360: “The latter is the focus of the zoom in the lower panels of Fig. 13…”
- 29, Fig. 17: Define p in the caption.
- 38, line 585: Word missing after “resultant”
-
AC1: 'Reply on RC1', Bjorn Stevens, 14 May 2021
We thank the reviewer for their encouraging comments, and suggestions for improvement. We have addressed all the rcomments as suggested. On the more substantial points:
- We have analyzed the diurnal cycle over the BCO at the surface and at 400 me and compared these to near surface measurements from the Meteor. A diurnal cycle is evident in both locations, and is similar but substantially more pronounced (1.27 K vs 0.53 K) at the BCO. This is now discussed in the manuscript.
- We analyzed the 3hr changes in Ragged Point CCN measurements. These are usually less than 10%, and 80% of the time less than 30%. Given the much larger changes over periods of day and that an analysis period roughly corresponds to the 3hr period of the ATR, Twin-Otter and HALO circling, this is encouraging for the utility of the data for exploring aerosol-cloud interactions
The other minor comments were addressed by discussing the adequacy of the measurements for measuring the diel cycle and addressing the data availability quesiton -- most data is already available. Technical comments were addressed as suggested.
-
RC2: 'Comment on essd-2021-18', Anonymous Referee #2, 18 Mar 2021
General comments
The paper presents an overview of goals, design, the proceeding and first outcomes of EUREC4A project conducted in January and February 2020 in the vicinity of Barbados island on Atlantic trade winds region. Observations merged measurements conducted in the atmosphere (trade wind clouds) and in the ocean in wide span of time and space scales. The ultimate goal of the campaign was to improving our understanding of how the global warming could affect the trade wind clouds.
EUREC4A was undoubtedly the more complex and exhaustive observation campaign conducted ever. It is not common to review a paper describing such a complex experiment, probably because it is the first publication that engages with the challenge to present in a concise way such diverse measurements. Being specialist on atmospheric physics I won’t pretend that I understood all subtleties of ocean measurements. However, the paper offers a fluent narrative that allows even a non-specialist to catch the main ideas of observations performed. Still, I have few suggestions that could improve the overall understanding of the project (see below).
Specific comments:
Figures give a general overview of a kind of measurements performed during the experiment. Very often they are very complex and I think that they deserve more descriptions. I understand that those figures should give only an overview of what was observed, however a huge diversity of data make it difficult to understand for non-specialists (as atmospheric scientists versus oceanic scientists). I would appreciate if more attention is given to explain in some general yet concise manner what message could be inferred from those measurements.
Technical remarks:
p.4 Abstract, line 5; ‘or’ used twice.
p.5 l. 30: ‘to RICO’ should be probably ‘and RICO’
Figure 2, what is really shown in this figure? Is it a composition of all flights, dropsondes patterns, radiosonde soundings from the whole experiment? Colors in the figure don’t correspond exactly to the colors in the legend…. Or it is only me that cannot see correctly.
Figure 8, the scale for the isentropic lapse rate is missing, or I cannot see where it is. Or the dashed line does not represent a lapse rate?
p. 18, l. 268-269: ‘eighteen coordinated (4h flight segments)’ …. Should ‘segments’ be outside the parantheses?
Figure 11 deserves a legend more ‘compatible’ with descriptions in different parts of the figure. For instance: in the figure we see ‘CloudKite hologram’ that is described as MPCK+ in the legend.
p. 22 l 329: Prospero and Carlson, 2020, NOT ‘J M Prospero….’
p. 35 l. 535: ‘Holland’ should be ‘The Netherlands’
-
AC2: 'Comment on essd-2021-18', Bjorn Stevens, 14 May 2021
We have substantially addressed all of the comments in this reviews, as was suggested. The major change has been to revise most figures and figure captions to more consistently adhere to standards (also for names, and distinguishing between quantites such as height, altitude and depth), clarify figure elements, changing colors to make some aspects more clear, and to strengthen the description of the figure in the captions.
The one comment where there is a slight chance we misunderstood the reviewer comment, or did not address it adquately was on the laspe rate for the composite boundary layer figure, Fig 8. The dashed line is constant as the lifted parcel is unsaturated and then Θ increases after it ascends beyond the LCL. Originally we desribed the dashline as denoting the lapse rate, which is incorrect, what it describes is the potential temperature along an isentrope of near-surface air. If this was the point of confusion, it has been corrected.
Bjorn Stevens et al.
Bjorn Stevens et al.
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