A Case Study of a Quasistationary, Very Long Polar Stratospheric Cloud Layer Edge

Abstract

A case study of the occurrence of polar stratospheric clouds (PSCs) on February 13th, 2017, in northern Sweden is reported in this paper. For the first time, a quasistationary edge of a bright and extended PSC layer (∼ 600-km long) on the eastern side of the Scandinavian mountain range was photographed and registered using lidar observations. Both lidar measurements and model simulations demonstrated that atmospheric conditions were fairly unchanged for several hours during the presence of the PSC. Strong winds across the Scandinavian mountain range were responsible for triggering the formation of mountain lee waves in the Kiruna area, which induced the formation of the quasistationary long and straight edge of the PSCs.