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Cloud Radiative Forcing Over the Beaufort Sea and North Slope of Alaska

Key, E.L.(a), Minnett, P.J.(a), Evans, R.H.(a), and Papakyriakou, T.N.(b), University of Miami, RSMAS (a), University of Manitoba, CEOS (b)
Fourteenth Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Science Team Meeting

As a continuing focus of Arctic surveys, the North Slope of Alaska and Adjacent Arctic Ocean (NSA-AAO) area has hosted several large-scale polar projects with a focus on the complex feedback between the polar atmosphere and changing Arctic surface. During the high positive index phase of the Arctic Oscillation, ice cover in the Beaufort Sea in 2000 reached a minimum only surpassed by the extreme low of 2002. In order to study this amplified summer melt scenario, data from the ARM NSA coastal installation, SHEBA ice station, and USCGC Polar Star are combined with remotely-sensed radiation, meteorology, and cloud measurements, forging a link between coastal, ice-pack, and open-water atmospheric dynamics. Despite very different microphysical ranges, moisture profiles, and surface cover, surface cloud radiative forcing at the shipboard and coastal sites were remarkably similar. At both of these sites, low stratus cloud cover scattered more inocming shortwave radiation than it re-emiited as longwave radiation from cloud base, indicating a negative surface cloud forcing. However, the sign of this forcing changed, regardless of cloud form, at an 80-82 degree solar zenith angle.

Note: This is the poster abstract presented at the meeting; an extended version was not provided by the author(s).