ADM-Aeolus pre-launch activities and recent advances in spaceborne and airborne Wind Lidar Systems

Abstract

The first space-borne wind lidar mission ADM-Aeolus from ESA is currently scheduled for launch by mid-2017. For the preparation of the Aeolus validation, an airborne field experiment was performed during 3 weeks in May 2015 with the DLR Falcon and the NASA DC-8 aircraft. For the first time 4 wind lidars were deployed during an airborne campaign including two coherent and two direct-detection wind lidars at a wavelength of 2μm and 355 nm. A total of 7 coordinated flights of the Falcon and DC-8 yielded an extensive dataset. Additionally, DLR’s airborne coherent Doppler Wind Lidar was recently deployed in 3 coordinated airborne campaigns aiming to investigate the life cycle of gravity waves from ground up to the mesosphere. The horizontal and vertical wind measurements of the lidar provide valuable data for characterizing tropospheric gravity waves and background wind conditions.