21 August 1995
PH: Okay. To summarize what we've done so far. We did a vertical profile in clear air before the (IBAMA prescribed) fire was lit, except there were a number of fires around this area so it was not completely clean. Then we dropped down to 5,000 ft and did a reciprocal for wind direction measurements. Then we waited around for about 45 mins or so and then the fire was lit. Then we waited for about 20 mins after it was lit, it was a bit of a disappointment; it didn't produce a great deal of smoke and it didn't rise very high. But we did two passes through the thickest part of the smoke that we could see for chemistry and aerosol measurements. Then we went off and let the Banderante do its passes along the length of the plume, back again, did four of those. Then it got out of the way and we headed back to do a vertical cross section through the plume. Actually some of the other fires in the area were bigger than the (prescribed) one we looked at, but I don't think they directly interfered with our measurements on the IBAMA burn.
PH: Okay. Final summary. We did our vertical profiles across the width of the plume from the IBAMA burn as best we could. We had one try which didn't work out, because it was too close to the head of the (prescribed) fire and the plume was too low. So we moved downwind a bit and then we got three cuts across the width of the plume, at three different altitudes, came out on top, climbed, did a lidar profile across the width of the plume as the plane drifted downwind, and then we started our runs along the length of the plume; we have done one, and we are now doing our second track along the length of the plume, with the Banderante doing the same thing beneath us.
PH: Ron, summarize the flight quickly.
RF: The best lidar images I've ever seen. I think that will be real pay dirt when we're flying aloft with lidar and the Banderante is flying below us in this smoke. We've got good background samples, filters and cans and two good smoke samples, filters and cans. So I think we did what we had hoped to do. I didn't think too much of the cross section but it was kind of a bad situation for that sort of pattern.
PH: Ray, summarize quickly what you got.
RW: Didn't get too much smoke. The OEC worked pretty well in the smoke from the prescribed fire. The other fire we tried before was good because it helped to set up the flows which is something I hadn't been able to do yet. And the flows are matched real well. It's unclear if the humidigraph is working. There is no hygroscopic growth apparent at all. I don't know, we'll have to check it out somehow.
JR: Everything was okay. I didn't see anything go wrong with the instruments.