Aerosol Vertical Distribution Measured by LIDARs in Baengnyeongdo, Munsan, and Gunsan during 10~11 May 2010

This study aims to analyze the vertical distribution of Asian dust measured by LIDARs at three weather stations in Baengnyeongdo (BND), Munsan (MS), and Gunsan (GS) during 10~11 May 2010, and thereby investigate their effectiveness. Asian dust passed through from central to south-western part of Korea. Although dust particles were detected over the surface in MS and GS, LIDAR data showed that the Asian dust with non-spherical particles was observed in all of the three regions. It seems that the naked-eye observation could not detect dust over the surface of BND due to the temperature inversion below a height of 0.45 km. During the Asian dust events, the duration time of dust presented 9.5 hr (BND), 19.5 hr (MS), and 24.5 hr (GS), respectively with the longest time in GS, whereas dust altitudes ranged from 0.4 to 1.3 km (BND), 0.1 to 2.8 km and 4.1 to 4.2 km (MS), and 0.2 to 2.0 km (GS), respectively, while showing the highest altitude in MS. Aerosol optical thickness (AOT) retrieved by LIDAR and skyradiometer (SR), located close to the LIDAR sites, was compared. MS (LIDAR) and Seoul (SR) attained the AOT of 0.64 and 0.50, and GS (LIDAR) and Gongju (SR) attained the AOT of 0.38 and 0.54, respectively. As SR-derived angstrom exponents (AE) during the time period determined as Asian dust by LIDAR data were 0.17 in Seoul (near MS) and 0.30 in Gongju (near GS), it can be said that the characteristics of dust particles were appeared. During the study period, depolarization ratio could serve as a useful indicator to determine dust aerosol. But, it still seems essential to conduct further investigation with longer period of data to better describe the discrepancy of AOT between LIDARs and SR.