Saharan dust event over Bucharest observed by an elastic backscatter lidar

A lidar measurements campaign took in Magurele Platform, southwestern part of Bucharest, during on June 25th, 26th and 28th of 2007 and was intended for aerosol loading characteristics over the urban area. An event of long-range Saharan dust transport to Eastern Europe (Romania) observed during this time is presented in here. We have used an elastic backscattering lidar, based on an Nd:YAG laser, at 1064nm sounding wavelength. It can detect in real time aerosols density profiles up to 10 Km high with a spatial resolution of 12 m. Origin of lidar sampled air masses arriving at various heights over Bucharest have been determined by the analytical back-trajectories from NOAA HYSPLIT model. Saharan dust layers reached the southern part of Romania predominantly by cyclonic circulation due to the strong through observed at all the levels from a cyclonic system located in northwestern part of Africa. Analysis of cloud cover and dust load was estimated by the Dust Regional Atmospheric Modeling (Dream model). The dust event presented highlights how the synergy of Lidar data together with 3-D back trajectories analysis and model calculations can improve our ability to determine accurately the source of high aerosol loading.