As time goes by...

...while the snow melts down.

Since the two aircrafts are grounded due to fog unfavourable for takeoff and landing at LYR airport one can take a look back in time for the last weeks. While already very valuable data could be collected on the research flights also the landscape in Longyearbyen changed quite significantly. Especially when adding two pictures from before the campaign in March and April.

Currently the snow suffers from the warm and moist air transported to the area! Arctic amplification on even shorter time scales...?...no, it's just spring! :-)
With the wind direction turning more to the north flying conditions are supposed to improve over the course of the week. Keep fingers crossed!

Grounded due to fog

Webcam at Zeppelin Mointain

Unfortunally, we are grounded scince two days. This time the problem is the local weather. A warm and moist air mass was transportet into Svalbard producing low clouds up to the position of Polarstern. Low clouds and especially fog as predicted in the aviation weather forecast are not favorable for starting and landing an airplane under visual flight conditions. That's why had to cancel flights yesterday and to postpone this morning.

The strange situation is, that locally, no clouds or fog are present in Isfjorden while in Ny Alesund, the Kongsfjorden is completely overcasted as shown by the webcam at Zeppelin Mointain. This is certainly due to local effects of the mountains and fjords. Obviously these local conditions can not be precisely forecasted by the weather models... One reason why we are here and aim to characterize such clouds in detail. Only that these clouds now stop us from measuring. Let's hope for other winds and no clouds at the airport.

Another joint flight toward Polarstern

After a two day break, today Polar 5 & 6 are again up in the skies. Destination: Ny Alesund -- A-Train -- Polarstern -- Ny Alesund -- and back.

As it happens, Polar 6 always takes off first, then Polar 5 follows. After 13 flights, this already became kind of a ACLOUD ritual. As Bill, our Polar 6 pilot in command, said: "P6 always goes first!".

This picture was taken during one of the last starts. So why is the Polar 5 schadow not in place? Or is it just another Polar Shark?

Take care when next time passing the glacier!

We could start playing some good music via the headphones having 5 hours P5/6 missions.

Second week over and spring arrived

The second week of ACLOUD flight activities ended with some spectacular clouds in the Isfjorden and spring like temperatures in Longyearbyen.
Polar 5&6 did fly for a fourth time to RV Polarstern. Yesterday it was the third time in a row we could sample the "same" clouds. At least clouds in the same air mass, which was warm air transported from south-west and sliding over the cold sea ice. The measurements worked well and we were quite surprised, that these clouds still produced a lot of ice crystals.

Also in the Isfjord a special cloud was present all the day close to the mountians. Streched like a snake along the slope of the mountaind, it reminds to the Maloja Snake in the Alps.


Here in town and sourrounding, the snow melts very quick. Also some first tiny flowers were discovered.

Fascinating Clouds in False Color

During ACLOUD we often look at satellite images to determine the coordinated of the flight pattern and have a most recent look on the weather or to analyze in which area and clouds regime the last flights have been finally flown. One instrument we like is MODIS for which a lot of images and products are available online. Looking into the detailled images you can discover a multitude of different cloud structures and phenomena. Especially when using false color images such like these:






Clouds pressing into the fjords...

Vortex like clouds at the southern tip of Svalbard...

Inhomogeneous convective clouds?

Strato cumulus in different scales...

Non-Flight Day Activities

Yesterday no flight was scheduled because the local weather was expected to show low clouds and limit the flight conditions. As it may happen, the day finally was almost completely sunny. Some of the ALCOUD Team used the time to participate in the Spitsbergen Marathon. A 10km run, the Spitsbergenmila, was the goal, In total, about 300 runner were on the track in the 10K, full and half marathon and guarded by a polar bear watch outside the town. All of the ACLOUD Team finished having a lot of fun on the scenic track down to the airport which we usually only go by car.