The Small Whiskbroom Imager for atmospheric compositioN monitorinG (SWING) and its operations from an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) during the AROMAT campaign

Abstract

Abstract. The Small Whiskbroom Imager for atmospheric compositioN monitorinG (SWING) is a compact remote sensing instrument dedicated to mapping trace gases from an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV). SWING is based on a compact visible spectrometer and a scanning mirror to collect scattered sunlight. Its weight, size, and power consumption are respectively 920 g, 27 x 12 x 8 cm3, and 6 W. SWING was developed in parallel with a 2.5 m flying wing UAV. This unmanned aircraft is electrically powered, has a typical airspeed of 100 km h−1, and can operate at a maximum altitude of 3 km. We present SWING-UAV experiments performed in Romania on 11 September 2014 during the Airborne ROmanian Measurements of Aerosols and Trace gases (AROMAT) campaign. The UAV was operated up to 700 m above ground, in the vicinity of the large power plant of Turceni (44.67° N, 23.41° E, 116 m a.s.l.). These SWING-UAV flights were coincident with another airborne experiment using the Airborne imaging Differential Optical Absorption Spectroscopy (DOAS) instrument for Measurements of Atmospheric Pollution (AirMAP), and with ground-based DOAS, lidar, and balloone-borne in-situ observations. The spectra recorded during the SWING-UAV flights are analyzed with the DOAS technique. This analysis reveals NO2 differential slant column densities (DSCDs) up to 13 ± 0.6 x 1016 molec cm−2. These NO2 DSCDs are converted to vertical column densities (VCDs) by estimating air mass factors. The resulting NO2 VCDs are up to 4.7 ± 0.4 x 1016 molec cm−2. The water vapor DSCD measurements, up to 8 ± 0.15 x 1022 molec cm−2, are used to estimate a volume mixing ratio of water vapor in the boundary layer of 0.013 ± 0.002 mol mol−1. These geophysical quantities are validated with the coincident measurements.

High-resolution mapping of the NO<sub>2</sub> spatial distribution over Belgian urban areas based on airborne APEX remote sensing

“…The APEX flights over Berlin took place in the framework of the ESA-EUFAR supported AROMAPEX campaign, clustered in the AROMAT project (Airborne ROmanian Measurements of Aerosols and Trace gases). Two additional imagers, AirMAP (Airborne imaging DOAS instrument for Measurements of Atmospheric Pollution; Schönhardt et al, 2015;Meier et al, 2016) and SWING (Small Whiskbroom Imager for atmospheric composition monitoriNG; Merlaud et al, 2013), were simultaneously operated from a Cessna from the Free University of Berlin, providing a unique data set for intercomparison purposes. These new data sets are currently under analysis, taking into account the findings and lessons learned from the research described in this paper.…”

High resolution mapping of the NO<sub>2</sub> spatial distribution over Belgian urban areas based on airborne APEX remote sensing

“…Only a few recent studies report on the high resolution 2D spatial mapping of the NO 2 horizontal distribution from an airborne platform. The discussed hyperspectral imaging systems are based on a whiskbroom (Merlaud et al, 2013b;Liu et al, 2015) or pushbroom setup (Heue et al, 2008;Popp et al, 2012;General et al, 2014;Lawrence et al, 2015;Schönhardt et al, 2015;Meier et al, 2016;Nowlan et al, 2016).…”

First aircraft test results of a compact, low cost hyperspectral imager for earth observation from space

“…Spectrolite Berlin flight L0-1B data processor. [4], AirMAP [5] and SWING [6]. Much of this work remains to be done and will be described in future publications.…”