Airborne measurements from the Southern California Investigation of Low cloud and Land Aerosol (SCILLA)

Abstract. The Southern California Investigation of Low cloud and Land Aerosol (SCILLA) was an airborne field experiment flown in June 2023 based out of San Diego, California. The objectives of the experiment were to investigate dynamical controls on aerosol transport from land over the ocean, quantify the impacts of aerosol-cloud interactions on planetary boundary layer (PBL) evolution, and characterize gradients in atmospheric properties across the PBL-topping inversion to constrain transport hypotheses. A total of 20 research flights were flown over the Southern California Bight, with 18 flights in the vicinity of San Clemente Island and an additional 2 flights over the Los Angeles basin and offshore of the adjacent coastline near Santa Monica and Malibu. A twin turboprop aircraft was outfitted with a broad array of instruments to sample basic meteorology (thermodynamics and winds); aerosol physical, chemical and radiative properties; cloud and drizzle microphysics; radiation; and trace gases. Detailed descriptions of flight sampling strategies, aircraft instrumentation and derived products are given and an overview of each research flight is provided as a reference for data users. The primary dataset, merged 1 and 10 Hz aircraft data, is globally available at https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21826965.