Airborne Measurement of Mass and Energy Exchange from Agricultural Lands

This paper describes the airborne measurement of mass and energy exchange from agricultural lands around the Ottawa area, in the 2003 field campaign, using the NRC Twin Otter atmospheric research aircraft. The aircraft was instrumented to measure the vertical fluxes of sensible and latent heat, momentum, carbon dioxide, ozone and nitrous oxide, along with supporting meteorological and radiometric data. The data was collected over two agricultural tracks –Casselman and Morewood - southeast of Ottawa. The fluxes were measured along a height of approximately 200 feet above ground level on repeated passes over the two tracks, each approximately 5 nautical miles in length. A total of 32 project flights were flown, accumulating 50 hours of flight data.

This paper details the instrumentation system in the NRC Twin Otter, along with descriptions of the aircraft operation during this 2003 field campaign. Measured fluxes and supporting meteorological and radiometric data are presented and discussed. This data forms part of a continuous database of year-to-year flux measurements made by the NRC Twin Otter over the last 4 years.