CEOP_AP Pakistan Karakorum Reference Site Urdukas Station

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Regional Hydroclimate Project:

CEOP_AP

Coordinated Energy and water cycle Observation Project_Asia and Pacific

Reference Site Name:

Pakistan Karakorum Station Name:

Urdukas Other Stations at Reference Site:

Askole

Reference Site Representative:

Name:

Affiliation:

Address:

Via San Bernardino, 145 24126 Bergamo, Italy

E-mail:

Telephone:

Fax:

Data Management Contact:

Name:

Affiliation:

Address:

Via San Bernardino, 145 24126 Bergamo, Italy

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Telephone:

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Associated Web Sites:

Station Location, Maps and Google Earth Files:

Pakistan Karakorum Regional Map (click for full resolution):

Urdukas Local Map (click for full resolution):

Google Earth .kmz file of CEOP_AP Pakistan Karakorum Reference Site stations and radiosonde locations

Station Description:

General Description:

The HKKH mountain ranges are extraordinarily high mountain chains, spanning over thousands of kilometers across 6 South Asian countries and encompassing an extensive diversity of flora and fauna, unparalleled natural beauty and many varied cultures. They harbour some of the world.s richest but atmospherically, climatically, geologically and ecologically sensitive and fragile environments and biodiversity, and many protected areas of profound importance are in these mountain regions. The glaciers in these mountains feed most of the major river systems in the region (Ganges, Indus, Brahmaputra, Salween, Mekong, Yangtze and Yellow Rivers) - lifeline for hundreds of millions of peoples downstream. The Central Karakorum ecosystem in the Northern area of Pakistan is endowed with rich floral and faunal biodiversities, natural beauty and other natural resources such as forest resources.

The Baltoro Glacier, 62 km long, is one of the longest glaciers outside of the Polar Regions. It is located in Baltistan, in the Northern Areas of Pakistan, and runs through part of the Karakoram mountain range. In the middle of the Baltoro glacier there is the campsite of Urdukas located on the trek way to Concordia. The automatic weather station was installed on the Baltoro Glacier, more precisely on a moraine ridge close to the left glacier margin at 4000 m asl. At Urdukas the meteorological parameters (air temperature, wind speed and direction, air pressure, humidity, precipitation, global global radiation) are collected as hourly mean values since June 17, 2004.

The terrain around the Pakistan Karakorum Reference Site:

Station Operator:

Ev-K2-CNR Committee

Vegetation and Land Use:

Dominant land cover at the measurement location: No information.

Canopy height: No information.

Land cover within 50 m of site: No information.

Land cover within 500 m of site: No information.

Land cover within 12 km of site: No information.

Seasonal land cover changes: No information.

Major changes in land cover at site from October 2002 to December 2004: None.

Slope at the site: No information.

Other notes: None.

Soil Type and Characterization:

Surface soil type: No information.

Soil type in deeper layers: No information.

Surface soil porosity: No information.

Soil porosity in deeper layers: No information.

Soil infiltration rate: No information.

Bulk Dry Density: No information.

Saturated Hydraulic Conductivity: No information.

The Soil Reference Group(s) (from World Reference Base for Soil Resources): No information.

Climate:

The climate in high altitude mountains of the Northern Areas is in.uenced by the broad global circulation patterns associated with the position in the continental mass and the proximity to the oceans (Archer 2001). During the winter and spring period the Karakoram area is in.uenced mainly by a broad scale weather system originating primarily from the Mediterranean or from the area of the Caspian Sea (Singh et al. 1995) and from air mass convective storm in the pre-monsoon season (Archer 2001). According to Wake (1987) there are indications that at least some of the higher altitude precipitation is originating from westerly systems. In the winter however Archer (2001) claims that under the prevailing in.uence of the Tibetan anticyclone, local conditions are dominant. It goes without saying that mountain climates are also in.uenced on the medium and local scale by elevation, valley orientation, aspect and slope and the height and number of upwind barriers to the airflow.

In spite of climate changes, studies carried out on Baltoro Glacier show small and limited variations its extension in the last 50 years (Mihalcea et al., 2006, 2008). In fact this zone is characterized by low temperatures and a climate very wet. The different activity of Baltoro Glacier in respect to most of the mountain glaciers is most likely due to the different supraglacial conditions characterising its glacier tongue. On Baltoro Glacier the debris insulation effect allowed a larger quantity of ice in the glacier tongue to be conserved. The climate isn.t influenced by monsoons and precipitations present a regular trend.

CEOP Parameters Measured and Instrumentation:

SURFACE METEOROLOGY AND RADIATION INSTRUMENTATION AND DESCRIPTION:

Station pressure 2m CX115P Lsi-Lastem (Italy)
Air Temperature 2m DMA570 Lsi-Lastem (Italy)
Dew point - 2m (derived)
Relative humidity 2 m DMA570 Lsi-Lastem (Italy)
Specific humidity 2m (derived)
Wind speed 5m DNA022 Lsi-Lastem (Italy)
Wind direction 5m DNA022 Lsi-Lastem (Italy)
U wind component 5m (derived)
V wind component 5m (derived)
Precipitation - 1.5m DQA035 Lsi-Lastem (Italy)
Snow depth - Not measured.
Incoming shortwave radiation - CM6B Kipp&Zonen (The Netherlands)
Outgoing shortwave radiation - Not measured.
Incoming longwave radiation - Not measured.
Outgoing longwave radiation - Not measured.
Net radiation 2m (derived).
Skin temperature - Not measured
Incoming Photosynthetically Active Radiation (PAR) - Not measured.
Outgoing Photosynthetically Active Radiation (PAR) - Not measured.
Surface meteorological station at Urdukas:

METEOROLOGICAL TOWER INSTRUMENTATION AND DESCRIPTION:

No tower data available.

FLUX INSTRUMENTATION AND DESCRIPTION:

Sensible Heat Flux Not measured
Latent Heat Flux Not measured
CO2 Flux Not measured
Soil Heat Flux (5 cm depth; Soil Heat Flux DPE260 Lsi-Lastem (Italy)

SOIL INSTRUMENTATION AND DESCRIPTION:

Soil Temperature: -5 cm; -20 cm DLA400 Lsi-Lastem (Italy)
Soil Moisture: -5 cm HMS9000 Sdec (France)

RADIOSONDE INSTRUMENTATION AND DESCRIPTION:

No data of this type available at this station.

Site References

Ev-K2-CNR

Literature:

Baudo R., G. Tartari and E. Vuillermoz. 2007. Mountains witnesses of global changes. Research in the Himalaya and Karakoram: SHARE-Asia project. Elsevier, Development in Earth Surface Processes, 10: 342 pp.

Mihalcea, C., C. Mayer, G. Diolaiuti, C. D.agata, C. Smiraglia, A. Lambrecht, E. Vuillermoz and G. Tartari. 2008. Spatial distribution of debris thickness and melting from remote-sensing and meteorological data, at debris-covered Baltoro glacier, Karakoram, Pakistan. Annals of Glaciology, 48: 49-57.

Mihalcea, C., C. Mayer, G. Diolaiuti, A. Lambrecht, C. Smiraglia and G. Tartari. 2006. Ice ablation and meteorological conditions on the debris-covered area of Baltoro glacier, Karakoram, Pakistan. Ann. Glaciol., 43, 292-300.

Singh P., Ramashastri K.S., Kumar N. 1995. Topographic influences on precipitation distribution in different ranges of the Western Himalayas. Nordic Hydrology 26, S. 259-284

Wake C.P. 1987. Snow accumulation studies in the central Karakoram. Proceedings of the Eastern Snow Conference North America 44th Annual Meeting, S. 19-33

Presentations:

September 2007 - Bali, Indonesia

Himalayas and Pakistan

Tartari, G., E. Vuillermoz, P. Bonasoni, E. Manfredi & B. Schommer. 2009. High Altitude environmental monitoring: the SHARE project and CEOP-HE. European Geosciences Union General Assembly 2009, Vienna, Austria, 19 . 24 April 2009.

Schommer, B., C. Belotti, E. Vuillermoz & G. Tartari. 2008. The Ev-K2-CNR Contribution to mountain ecosystem conservation and the study of climate change. International Mountain Biodiversity Conference, Kathmandu, Nepal, 15 . 17 November 2008.

Tartari, G. 2008. Ev-K2-CNR Climatic studies at CEOP Reference sites in Himalaya and Karakorum Regions. International Conference on Hydrology and Climate Change in Mountainous Areas, Kathmandu, Nepal, 15 . 17 November.

Vuillermoz, E., L. Bertolani, C. Smiraglia, G.P. Verza, G. Tartari, A. Marinoni & P. Bonasoni. 2006. SHARE- Asia Automatic Weather Station Network: an integral component for climate research in the Karakorum . Himalayas region. I International Workshop on Energy and Water Cycle over the Tibetan Plateau, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Lhasa, Tibet, China, 3-12 September, 2006.

Tartari, G., E. Vuillermoz, G.P. Verza & B. Schommer. 2005. SHARE-ASIA Project. Meteoclimatic resear- ch in Himalaya and Karakorum. CEOP/IGWCO Joint Meeting, Tokyo, Japan, 28 February . 4 March, 2005.

Data Sets and Documentation: