Aircraft Observations of Characteristics and Growth of Ice Particles of Two Different Snowfall Clouds in Shanxi Province, China

The ice crystal habits, distributions and growth processes in two snowfall cloud cases on 29 November 2009 and 3 March 2012 in northern China were compared and analyzed with aircraft data. The results showed that ice crystal habits were affected by the height of ice clouds. Ice crystals in clouds with cloud top temperatures of -12.6 degrees C were predominantly needle, plate, dendrite and irregular. When the cloud top temperature was lower than -19.5 degrees C, plates, dendrites and irregular ice crystals were observed in addition to needles, capped-column crystals were observed in the lower and middle layers of clouds, and column crystals were observed in the upper layer of clouds. The liquid water content of the two snowfall processes was lower than 0.1 g center dot m(-3). Ice particles grew mainly via deposition, riming and aggregation processes. On 29 November, the liquid water content of the stratospheric mixed snowfall cloud was distributed in the lower part of the cloud. The maximum values of particle concentration and ice water content detected by a cloud imaging probe were 187 L-1 and 1.05 g center dot m(-3), which were at -8.7 degrees C, and the ice water content was higher. On 3 March, the liquid water content of snowfall in stratiform clouds was located in the middle layer, and the maximum ice water was low, which was only 0.052 g m(-3). The ice water value on 29 November was higher, which was mainly due to the convective zone embedded in the cumulus mixed cloud containing a large number of riming and aggregated snow crystals. Using an exponential function to fit the crystal spectrum of the two snowfall processes, N-0 and lambda were 10(9)-10(11) m(-4) and 10(8)-10(10) m(-4) and 10(3)-10(4) m(-1) and 10(4) m(-1), respectively. Compared with 3 March, N-0 on 29 November was larger and the variation range of lambda was one more order of magnitude. N-0 and lambda conformed to a power function distribution. By analyzing the scatter plot of the correlation coefficient and slope, it was found that the exponential function can accurately express the crystal spectrum of snow clouds.