Day 54 to 57: Fifth Science Flight

Here we go again. After finished the pre-flight and the science meeting we are ready to go airborne one more time.

On Feb 26 at 9:59 am (PST) the Global Hawk 672 took off from Edwards Air Force base heading south to Hawaii. I’m sure you are wondering why we fly to this area so often. Well, our brilliant group of meteorologists and modelers always keep an eye on the weather conditions and try to find the perfect locations to fulfill the objective of our missions. For this flight, this area was characterized by the presence of anticyclonic circulation, very cold air, considerable condensed water, and low water vapor concentrations. So, from our scientific point of view, this was an exciting flight.

On the other hand, the flight kept me busy most of the time. Once again, we performed nine verticals profile which forced us to power up and power down the instrument several times. Besides, the absence of one of our satellite bands, made the sampling strategy a little bit complicated. There were a lot of delays for getting confirmation of the commands we sent. However, one of the most exciting parts was to execute two of these vertical profiles near to the area where another group was performing balloon measurements. Comparisons between our measurements and the ones obtained by this group will be extremely helpful, not only for us but also for all the scientific community interested on knowing the behavior of ozone and water vapor along the different layers of the atmosphere.    

Day 58 and 59: Sixth Science Flight

Our ATTREX 2013 last flight I have a bittersweet feeling and a strange sensation which is hard to explain. I’m excited to complete our mission, but at the same time it is sad for me to perform my last flight. I know I will be do it again in a blink of an eye, but believe me, with my lack of sleep it is hard to control my emotions. So, here we are again (and for the last time), on March 1 around 6:15 am (PST) the Global Hawk 672 took off from Edwards Air Force Base heading south of the equator and along the continental line. 24 hours of excitement, particularly in the southern part of the leg where we found a huge cloud which allowed us to take a lot of measurements. Without a doubt, one of the most entertaining flights! I collected a great amount of samples around this cloud. At some point, I was even worried because I thought I would use all my canisters here and I would not have anything else for our way back. However, the science mission crew was aware of the number of canisters left and worked with us to maximize the their  use.     

By the end of the flight, just before landing, I noticed that many of us were exhausted. We did feel the satisfaction of completing our last flight and the whole ATTREX 2013 campaign  was a success! We were surrounded by the most amazing crew of pilots, managers, scientists and modelers.

Next step, remove the instruments for the aircraft, pack our supplies and go home!

Day 60: GOOD BYE ATTREX 2013!

Wow! My two months of adventures have come to an end. Everyone packed and one by one have left the hangar. Yes, the place that I used to call “my office” for the last months looks empty, but it feels full; full of happy memories, funny moments and some frustrations.

It is hard to say good bye, but for all us it is more like a SEE YOU LATER…we will back in a couple of months to continue our mission. I’m sure ATTREX 2014 will be even better.

Thus, I don’t want to finish my blog without saying THANK YOU! Yes THANK YOU to ALL my ATTREX team. We made it! You guys are the most incredible, fascinating and enthusiastic team. It is an honor for me to be part of you, and I could not feel more proud. Let’s continue with our hard work (I know it is extremely HARD) but it is worth it.

I can’t wait to see you again to discuss the results of our measurements, and to prepare our next campaign in the beautiful area of GUAM.

ATTREX 2014! Here we Come!!!!!!