SCMS Program Summary

General Information

Program Title:

Small Cumulus Microphysical Study (SCMS)

Principle Investigators and Affiliation

Tammy Weckwerth, NCAR; James Wilson, NCAR; Tom Horst,NCAR; Charles Knight, NCAR

EOL ISS Support Staff:

Mike Susedik - Project Engineer
Lou Verstraete - Project Technician / Operator
Erik Miller - Project Associate Scientist / Operator
Santiago Newbery - Project Software Engineer
Steve Cohn - Project Scientist

Summary of Scientific Objectives:

The prime goal of the experiment was to study the relationship between horizontal convective rolls within the convective boundary layer and surface layer heat fluxes and surface layer wind profiles. Another goal was to document the initiation of convection and its association with these observed horizontal rolls.

Start and End Dates of Field Program:

17 July 1995 through 14 August 1995

Location of Field Program:

ISS - East of Mims Florida near Loughman Lake, on Snake Creek Bridge Road.

Measurement System / Expendables Requested:

One Integrated Sounding System (ISS) and 75 RS80 15L Vaisala radiosondes and balloons. In addition to ISS support, there were three PAM III sites, the "Mobile CLASS" (soundings and tethersonde base), the CP2 radar, and N2UW (the Wyoming King Air). Cloud photography was also an integral part of the effort.

Data Availability:

SCMS CLASS soundings are available at the EOL Archive:

Additional Information Regarding the Facilities:

Additional information on boundary layer profiler operation and data acquisition can be found in the following reference:

"Developments in UHF Lower Tropospheric Wind Profiling at NOAA's Aeronomy Lab", by D.A. Carter, K.S. Gage, W.L.Ecklund, W.M. Angevine, P.E. Johnston, A.C. Riddle, J. Wilson, and C.R. Williams, Radio Science, Vol. 30, #4, pp 997-1001, 1995.

Loughman Lake - Snake Creek Bridge Road ISS Site Description

The ISS site was located east of Mims, Florida, about three miles south of State Route 46, adjacent to Loughman Lake on a grass covered dirt road, heading to the southeast, named Snake Creek Bridge Road. Snake Creek Bridge Road was little more than matted-down vegetation with two tire tracks. There was swamp and vegetation (about five feet high) on either side of the road leading to the ISS container. For the most part, the road was the only dry land in this swampy area adjacent to the lake. The road bed was about two feet above the water level at the start of the project.

The ISS container was positioned about a mile out on Snake Creek Bridge Road on a wide portion of dry ground. There were a few small palm trees in the area, three palm trees just to the east of the ISS container and a few more farther down the road past the PAM III site. (A PAM III site was deployed about 100 yards farther down Snake Creek Bridge Road.) The trees near the ISS container were a few feet higher than the top of the profiler clutter screen.

The ISS container was positioned just to the side of the road with its long axis on a heading of 132 degrees. Four RASS speakers were positioned around the container, two on each side. The surface meteorological instrumentation ten-meter tower was positioned about 47 feet from the southern most corner of the container, at 190 degrees, in the middle of the grass covered road. The rain gauge was placed 44 feet straight down the road from the ten-meter tower, one meter above the ground. The telemetry antenna tower was positioned 28 feet from the southern most corner of the container, at 150 degrees.

The wind sensor was mounted on a spar below the top of the ten-meter "met" tower at approximately 8.5 meters AGL. (Lightning protection was placed on top of the tower.) The other surface meteorological sensors (temperature, relative humidity, solar radiation, and net radiation) were all grouped at about 2 meters AGL on the tower. The surface pressure sensor was located in the electronics box at about one meter AGL on the ten-meter tower.

Two photographs of the site are available on the web.