Observing Profiles of Advection, Vorticity, and Divergence from Ground-Based Networks of Thermodynamic and Kinematic Profilers

As profiling technologies mature and as ground-based profiling sites continue to proliferate, the opportunity now exists to measure important parameters that incorporate the spatial variability of atmospheric characteristics. Given a network of profiling nodes that feature both thermodynamic and kinematic profiling systems, vertical profiles of temperature and moisture advection, moist flux convergence, and other key quantities can be retrieved. Observing these quantities in real time allows operational forecasters to monitor changes that have important impacts on boundary layer stability, convective development, and other sensible weather applications.

The Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Southern Great Plains facility in north central Oklahoma in the United States provides an ideal location to evaluate the performance of such techniques. Observation sites spaced approximately 50 km apart each host an Atmospheric Emitted Radiance Interferometer (AERI) and a Halo Photonics Doppler Wind Lidar (DWL) which are capable of observing the thermodynamic and kinematic profiles respectively. Data from these sites are used to calculate vertical profiles of advection and flux, and these results will be compared to the corresponding values calculated from the gridded High Resolution Rapid Refresh (HRRR) numerical model forecast grids. Initial results show agreement between the profiler-observed and model-grid-calculated moisture advection in both magnitude and sign, showing that the implementation of such techniques has promise for the operational meteorology community.