Nickovic Slobodan, Cvetkovic Bojan, Petković Slavko, Amiridis Vassilis, Pejanović Goran, Solomos Stavros, Marinou Eleni, Nikolic Jugoslav
Republic Hydrometeorological Service of Serbia, 11000, Belgrade, Serbia.
National Observatory of Athens, Athens, Greece.
Sci Rep. 2021 Mar 19;11(1):6411. doi: 10.1038/s41598-021-85566-y.
Ice particles in high-altitude cold clouds can obstruct aircraft functioning. Over the last 20 years, there have been more than 150 recorded cases with engine power-loss and damage caused by tiny cloud ice crystals, which are difficult to detect with aircraft radars. Herein, we examine two aircraft accidents for which icing linked to convective weather conditions has been officially reported as the most likely reason for catastrophic consequences. We analyze whether desert mineral dust, known to be very efficient ice nuclei and present along both aircraft routes, could further augment the icing process. Using numerical simulations performed by a coupled atmosphere-dust model with an included parameterization for ice nucleation triggered by dust aerosols, we show that the predicted ice particle number sharply increases at approximate locations and times of accidents where desert dust was brought by convective circulation to the upper troposphere. We propose a new icing parameter which, unlike existing icing indices, for the first time includes in its calculation the predicted dust concentration. This study opens up the opportunity to use integrated atmospheric-dust forecasts as warnings for ice formation enhanced by mineral dust presence.
高海拔寒冷云层中的冰粒会妨碍飞机运行。在过去20年里，有超过150起有记录的案例显示，微小的云冰晶导致发动机动力损失和损坏，而飞机雷达很难检测到这些冰晶。在此，我们研究了两起飞机事故，官方报告称与对流天气条件相关的结冰是造成灾难性后果的最可能原因。我们分析了沙漠矿物尘埃是否会进一步加剧结冰过程，已知沙漠矿物尘埃是非常有效的冰核，且两条飞机航线沿线均有这种尘埃。通过使用一个耦合大气-尘埃模型进行数值模拟，并纳入了由尘埃气溶胶触发的冰核参数化，我们发现，在对流环流将沙漠尘埃带到对流层上部的大致事故地点和时间，预测的冰粒数量会急剧增加。我们提出了一个新的结冰参数，与现有的结冰指数不同，该参数在计算中首次纳入了预测的尘埃浓度。这项研究为利用综合大气-尘埃预报作为因矿物尘埃存在而增强的结冰形成的预警提供了机会。
