Flight 14: Okinawa-Yokota Transit
This flight between Okinawa and Yokota was planned to include
a northbound leg along 124.5E beginning at 30N stretching into
the Yellow Sea up to 37N, then south again before heading east
toward Yokota AFB, Japan. This mission was intended to sample
the same area of the Yellow Sea as flight 13 to capture strong
surface level outflow not present on the previous flight.
Results: On the initial ascent from Okinawa, a layer of
elevated CO and NOy was observed between 5-10 Kft. Clean
chemical conditions prevailed over the early portion of the flight
into the Yellow Sea down to 5 Kft, although a large dust plume
was encountered at 10Kft. The first polluted conditions were
encountered on a descent from 5000 to 500 ft with the most polluted
conditions persisting in the lowest 1000 ft. CO was sustained
above 700 ppbv and exceeded 1 ppm. SO2, NOy, and
PAN were also sustained above ppbv levels. Dust was also
encountered several more times during the flight between 5 and
10 Kft. Flying eastward toward Yokota, volcanic emissions
were encountered at 4.5 Kft with variations in SO2 of
several ppbv accompanied only by enhancements in CN and H2SO4. On
the final leg into Yokota, O3 reaching 122 ppbv was
encountered at 18 Kft.
