Case: 05 March 2019

Summary

A cold air outbreak cumulus cloud event that followed an overnight frontal passage

Description

A cold air outbreak cumulus cloud event that followed a synoptic wave that passed over the ENA main site during the early hours of this day. The open cells associated with this frontal passage were deep (e.g., cloud echo tops exceeding 4.0 km). Clouds transitioned to shallower, open cumulus cells by the morning hours. Light northerly winds were observed throughout the event. The melting level was observed at 2.0 km AGL throughout much of the event. This level was similar to the shallow cloud echo tops that were observed as this event progressed.

Available assets

Standard ARM profiling assets, SEVIRI. RLPROF-FEX

Critical period: 06:00-18:00

Shallow, open-cell cumulus over the ENA main site

True color MODIS AQUA — Figure 40 True color afternoon MODIS AQUA image with overlaid LES domains. The image domain corresponds to the size of the model forcing domain.