HALO

AEROCLOUD-FIRE​

AEROsol and CLOUD effects related to aviation and wildFIRE emissions

Mission Status: in planning

Persons in Charge

Mission-PI

Christiane Voigt (DLR-IPA & University of Mainz)
Yafang Cheng (MPIC)

Mission coordinator​

tba

Contact point at DLR-FX for this mission:

Address

HALO Deployment Base

Time Period

From – To

Mission phaseDates
Mission phaseDate
Mission phaseDate
Mission phaseDate

Project description

Short summary: AEROCLOUD-FIRE will provide a comprehensive data set on aerosol and cloud properties over America and Europe to advance our understanding on the effects of aircraft and wildfire emissions on clouds, dynamics and climate.

Aerosol-cloud interactions are amongst the least understood atmospheric processes in our climate system. Aerosol emissions from aircraft are expected to triple by 2050 and suggest strong increases in climate-warming contrails. Already today, contrails have a significant share to the total aviation climate effects. Yet, the exact magnitude of the contrail climate effects is highly uncertain and contrail formation at low soot emission levels on volatile aerosol is unexplored. Furthermore, climate change increases the frequency and intensity of wildfires. Aerosol-cloud-radiation interactions can influence atmospheric dynamics, plume transport and evolution, thereby potentially amplifying the impact of wildfires on climate and the environment.
The AEROCLOUD-FIRE campaign combines a novel set of in-situ aerosol, cloud and trace gas instruments, ion- and aerosol mass spectrometers, a cloud chamber, and the WALES lidar onboard HALO to accurately detect chemical, microphysical and radiative properties of aircraft and wildfire plumes. AEROCLOUD-FIRE will be supported by numerical simulations and satellite observations and is linked to international research projects (e.g. EU Horizon Europe, NASA, MIT).
In summer 2027, HALO will perform a measurement campaign to detect wildfire plumes, aerosol and contrails above North America and Europe.

Objectives

AEROCLOUD-FIRE will provide new data and insights into
Aviation Objective AO1: the microphysical properties of contrail cirrus to advance our understanding of contrail evolution and climate effect,
Aviation Objective AO2: the unresolved topic of contrail formation at low soot emission levels (e.g. by lean burn engines) – possibly induced by ions, sulfate, lubrication oil or ambient aerosol,
Aviation Objective AO3: the aerosol and cirrus distributions in the background and in perturbed conditions, as well as aerosol processing in the exhaust plume.

HALO will also execute a flight series from US/Canada to capture and track North American wildfire events and follow smoke plumes as they transverse over the Atlantic. HALO is ideally equipped to provide critical data and insights into:
FIRE Objective FO1: the frequency and mechanisms of transport of wildfire smoke plumes from the boundary layer to the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere (UTLS),
FIRE Objective FO2: the microphysical and chemical processes by which the aerosols and gaseous pollutants evolve within the plume and are removed from the atmosphere,
FIRE Objective FO3: aerosol-radiation-cloud interactions of wildfire-related soot and organic particles.

Partners

  • German Aerospace Center, Institute of Atmospheric Physics (DLR-IPA)
  • University of Mainz, Institute for Atmospheric Physics
  • Max-Planck-Institute for Chemistry (MPIC), Mainz
  • Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), Institute of Meteorology and Climate Research (IMK), Karlsruhe
  • Research Center Jülich (FZ Jülich)
  • Leipzig University, Leipzig Institute for Meteorology
  • Leibniz Institute for Tropospheric Research (TROPOS)
  • Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität
  • Goethe University, Institute for Atmospheric and Environmental Sciences

Scientific instruments and payload configuration

  • List of scientific instruments for the mission:

Scientific
instrument
acronym
DescriptionPrincipal investigatorInstitution
AcronymDescriptionNameInstitution
AcronymDescriptionNameInstitution
AcronymDescriptionNameInstitution
AcronymDescriptionNameInstitution
AcronymDescriptionNameInstitution
AcronymDescriptionNameInstitution
AcronymDescriptionNameInstitution
AcronymDescriptionNameInstitution
AcronymDescriptionNameInstitution
AcronymDescriptionNameInstitution
AcronymDescriptionNameInstitution
AcronymDescriptionNameInstitution
AcronymDescriptionNameInstitution

Cabin and exterior configuration of HALO for the mission

No blueprints available yet.

HALO flights for this mission

Aircraft registrationDateTake off - Landing / UTTotal flight time / hFrom - ToMission #
D-ADLRyyyy-mm-ddhh:mm:ss - hh:mm:sshCODE - CODE1
D-ADLRDatehh:mm:ss - hh:mm:sshCODE - CODE2
D-ADLRDatehh:mm:ss - hh:mm:sshCODE - CODE3
D-ADLRDatehh:mm:ss - hh:mm:sshCODE - CODE4
D-ADLRDatehh:mm:ss - hh:mm:ssh
CODE - CODE5
D-ADLRDatehh:mm:ss - hh:mm:sshCODE - CODE6
D-ADLRDatehh:mm:ss - hh:mm:sshCODE - CODE7
D-ADLRDatehh:mm:ss - hh:mm:sshCODE - CODE8
D-ADLRDatehh:mm:ss - hh:mm:sshCODE - CODE9
D-ADLRDatehh:mm:ss - hh:mm:sshCODE - CODE10
D-ADLRDatehh:mm:ss - hh:mm:sshCODE - CODE11

More information

No additional information available at this time.

Press releases, media etc

No press releases available yet.