the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
| 21 Nov 2025
Spatially distributed measurements of aerosols and stable isotopes in water vapour and precipitation in coastal Northern Norway during the ISLAS2021 campaign
Abstract. Precipitation from mixed-phase clouds at high-latitudes is difficult to represent correctly in numerical weather prediction models. Paired water vapour and precipitation isotope measurements provide a constraint on the integrated effect of evaporation and condensation processes, but have rarely been collected in a way that allows to use these for model validation and improvement. Here we present a collection of spatially distributed measurements of water isotopes in the different phases at high time resolution during the ISLAS2021 field campaign over the period 15 to 30 March 2021. The main observational site of this campaign was Andenes, Norway (69.3144°N, 16.1194°E). Isotopic measurements were conducted simultaneously at sea level and a mountain observatory, as well as additional coastal sites at distances of 100 km (Tromsø, Norway) and 1000 km (Bergen, Norway), enabling the assessment of spatial representativeness of vapour isotope measurements. Precipitation samples for water isotope analysis were collected on site at sub-event time resolution, and along a transect across the Lofoten archipelago. These measurements were complemented by a suite of aerosol measurements, including ice-nucleating particles, and additional in-situ and remote sensing observations of meteorological variables. During the two weeks of the ISLAS2021 field campaign, frequent alternations between mid-latitude and arctic weather systems were encountered, providing a range of different cases for more detailed process studies. Our dataset can serve as a test bed for assessing the spatial representativeness and sampling strategies for water isotope measurements on meteorological time scales. Furthermore, we anticipate our data to be useful in various aspects related to cloud microphysics, for example the quantification of riming processes in convective clouds, the role of ice nucleating particles in marine cold-air outbreaks, and on the condensation efficiency of mid-latitude storms.
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Status: final response (author comments only)
- RC1: 'review on essd-2025-548', Anonymous Referee #1, 23 Dec 2025
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RC2: 'Comment on essd-2025-548', Anonymous Referee #2, 23 Dec 2025
This manuscript documents an extensive observational effort during the ISLAS2021 campaign in coastal Northern Norway, combining water vapour and precipitation stable isotope measurements with aerosol, INP, and meteorological observations. The paper is generally well-structured, and the dataset is of clear value to the community. However, I have several substantive concerns and recommendations that should be addressed.
1) The Introduction are presented largely in parallel rather than converging towards clearly articulated goals. It remains unclear what the central scientific questions motivating ISLAS2021 are. The authors should explicitly state primary scientific questions, and clarify how the observational strategy was designed to address them. This would greatly strengthen the coherence of the manuscript.
2) A key strength of ISLAS2021 is the simultaneous measurement of water isotopes, aerosols/INPs, and meteorology. However, beyond the Introduction, the manuscript largely treats these components separately, with limited synthesis explaining how they jointly constrain atmospheric processes. The authors should include a short synthesis section or paragraph explicitly describing: how the different measurement components complement each other; which combinations of variables are expected to be most informative; and which limitations currently prevent a full joint analysis.
3) Spatial representativeness of vapour isotope measurements is repeatedly mentioned as a key motivation for the distributed network. However, the manuscript does not clearly summarize what spatial and temporal scales can realistically be probed with the available data. The authors should provide a qualitative (or semi-quantitative) assessment of the representativeness and scale of the observations, explicitly linking this to the network geometry and data availability.
4) The manuscript applies four different calibration strategies for the four CRDS analyzers, with large differences in uncertainty, particularly for the Coast site. While the authors describe these strategies in technical detail, the implications for data consistency and inter-site comparability are not adequately addressed. The authors must provide a concise, synthetic comparison of all analyzers, ideally in a single table, including calibration method and uncertainty ranges. The manuscript must explicitly state whether inter-site vapour isotope gradients can be meaningfully interpreted given the differing uncertainty levels. If no cross-site harmonization or bias assessment was attempted, this must be clearly acknowledged and justified.
5) Although uncertainty estimates are provided for individual instruments, the manuscript lacks a high-level synthesis that translates these uncertainties into practical implications for data use. The authors should include a synthesis section that explicitly addresses: Whether observed isotope variability typically exceeds measurement uncertainty; What temporal and spatial scales can be robustly investigated using this dataset; Which analyses are likely to be uncertainty-limited.
6) A significant strength of the manuscript is the detailed calibration discussion (Section 4.1), but it also reveals substantial differences in uncertainty across sites. Please summarize the spatial consistency and reliability of the data more explicitly in the main text (e.g., Section 5), and guide users on how to interpret or filter the lower-quality measurements. Are there any recommendations for users on which periods or sites are most reliable for process studies?
7) The case study is a key element to demonstrate dataset utility but currently lacks depth. Please expand the analysis to more fully demonstrate how the SWI and INP data co-evolve across multiple sites (e.g., Bergen–Tromsø–Andenes). Consider including a figure showing temporal evolution of δ18O, δD, and d-excess during a representative IOP, ideally aligned with meteorological context (e.g., pressure, IWV, radar reflectivity). Is there any evidence of isotope distillation or below-cloud processes that you can highlight?
8) The dataset includes a valuable INP record using the DRINCO method, but the presentation is minimal. Please expand on the sampling frequency, sensitivity, detection limits, and types of INPs targeted (biological vs mineral dust?). Indicate whether INP data have been used previously or how they compare to other Arctic datasets (e.g., Ny-Ålesund, ARM sites).
Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2025-548-RC2
Data sets
ISLAS2021: Calibrated stable water isotope measurements and aerosol measurements at the coast of northern Norway during March 2021 [dataset bundled publication] H. Sodemann et al. https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.984616
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- 1
This manuscript presents a huge dataset obtained during an observationnal atmospheric campaign in March 2021 in Norway including a lot of complementary measurements (aerosols, water isotopes) at different locations using facilities at different sites. The description of the acquisition and calibration methods is done carefully (but could be sometime a bit reduced to avoid repetitions). While no interpretation of the data is presented (as expected for a ESSD paper), the complementarity of the measurements is presented which opens the way to future studies.
This manuscript is in the scope of ESSD, the data are usefull for further studies of the cloud microphysics and the data quality is well assessed so that future users can do the best of this dataset. The manuscript can thus be accepted with only minor revisions as detailed below.
- In the abstract and several times during the manuscript, the spatial representativeness of vapour isotopes measurements is mentionned. This is an important added value of this study with several instruments running in parallel (despite the leak on one of the inlet lines). It would be nice to have also a statement in the « discussion – conclusion » on the spatial representativeness to have an idea of the scale of the processes which are studied here.
- In the introduction, the potential complementarity between INP and water isotopes is strongly underlined for process studies. However, later in the text, the INP data are not much described and it also lacks from the last section. Also the fact that the INP data are not made publicly available (but upon request) rise question on the usefullness of this dataset. I encourage the authors to detail more in a revised version the potential use of the INP data and its link with water isotopes data, not only in the introduction.
- l. 52,you already write about the d-excess while it is only defined 5 lines below.
- l. 101-105 and after. You describe very well the sampling strategy but the main scientific question addressed by this campaign is missing. It would be nice to explicit it.
- Table 3. I was wondering why the data acquisition could not be run continuously.
- Paragraph starting from l. 259 : it would help to have some ideas here on the sampling frequency and invoke the possibility of post-deposition effects (which are adressed later but it would be nice to introduce them here)
- l. 342-343 : I was wondering why the CRDS analysers could not operate continuously
- Caption of Figure 5. Can you explicit how you evaluate the data quality for the different instruments ?
- l. 375 : Why did you change the standard on 21 March 2021 ?
- l. 385-387 : Can you explicit why the analytical uncertainty for d18O is 1.25 permil on l. 386 and on l. 387, you mention that the total propagated uncertainty is 0.14 permil for d18O. In general, for this entire section, I had difficulty to understand how the number for uncertainties are evaluated. Since there are a lot of repetitions in this section (uncertainty calculation for each analysers), I would suggest to rewrite the section giving more details on the uncertainty calculation (or present some graphs) and then avoid repeating for all analysers except when there is a specificity as for the anlyser with a leak in the inlet line. A table to summarize the uncertainties for each analyser may also help reducing repetitions.
- l. 453 – 454 : I do not understand the sentence – especially, I do not understand the use of the first sample. Probably rewriting a bit this sentence would help clarifying.
- Figure 9 : It would help to have a label for the x-axis.
- Caption of Figure 11 : not sure that it is clear for the reader that d_ALOMAR is the d-excess since it was not defined as such in the manuscript before.
- l. 616-617 : can you better describe the « another step at about 12 :30 UTC »
- l.645 – 651 : it would be interesting to further detail the processes at play when comparing dD in precipitation and dD « expected from equilibrium fractionaton ». I find this section lacks from explanations on what has been calculated and how we can interpret processes such as exchanges between snow and water vapor or vertical advection. No reference is given also to support this interpretation. Please complete this section.
- Figure 13 : I think that there are some problems of coherency between the figure and the caption (caption describes panels from a to d while there are panels from a to e on the figure).