03 Dec 2021: LACROS packed and on its way back

  On Tuesday we had a small official decommissioning ceremony with the campaign PIs and officials from UMAG. At first Dr. Patric Seifert and Dr. Boris Barja González provided an overview on the achievements of DACAPO-PESO so far.

To quote Patric's conclusion:

"The DACAPO-PESO remote-sensing deployment was a big success and a great example of inter-department and inter-institutional collaboration. The campaign set highlight topics: Contrasting of cloud properties (https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-2021-360) and characterization and monitoring of the smoke plume from the Australian wildfires (https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-8003-2020). Another one will be the characterization of the in-situ INP by Xianda Gong et al. Also, there will be further publications cloud and aerosol properties!"

Then we moved to the container site. There, the rector of UMAG Dr. Juan Oyarzo Pérez and the vice rector for postgraduate studies Dr. Andrés Mansilla Muñoz started the very final radiosonde of the campaign together with Patric, Boris, and Raul Pérez. Afterwards the measurements were officially ended by the officials.

very_final_sonde_launch.jpg

Immediately after the event, Patric and me started packing the two LACROS containers. Within two working days, we disassembled the instruments, lowered the platform and packed everything in to boxes. Of course we also triggered a final datatransfer and backup.

lowering_hatpro.jpg

We progressed quite rapidly and Patric took the chance to visit the Cerro Mirador in-situ sampling site together with Boris and Raul. In collaboration between UMAGs LIA and the TROPOS cloud microphysics group, the in-situ observations there will continue for at least another year.

Then, on Friday, the logistics company arrived and collected the two containers for their transport to the harbor. Our request for a 'proper' crane got lost in the company's internal communication, but after some tampering the containers were successfully loaded.

crane.jpg

 In the evening we had a joint dinner with the project team at Los Ganaderos, picked up the frozen filter samples and left for the airport.

[mr, ps]