Recently published studies of triple-frequency radar observations of snowfall have demonstrated that naturally occurring snowflakes exhibit scattering signatures that are in some cases consistent with spheroidal particle models and in others can only be explained by complex aggregates. Until recently, no in situ observations have been available to investigate links between microphysical snowfall properties and their scattering properties. In this study, we investigate for the first time relations between collocated ground-based triple-frequency observations with in situ measurements of snowfall at the ground. The three analyzed snowfall cases obtained during a recent field campaign in Finland cover light to moderate snowfall rates with transitions from heavily rimed snow to open-structured, low-density snowflakes. The observed triple-frequency signatures agree well with the previously published findings from airborne radar observations. A rich spatiotemporal structure of triple-frequency observations throughout the cloud is observed during the three cases, which often seems to be related to riming and aggregation zones within the cloud. The comparison of triple-frequency signatures from the lowest altitudes with the ground-based in situ measurements reveals that in the presence of large (>5 mm) snow aggregates, a bending away in the triple-frequency space from the curve of classical spheroid scattering models is always observed. Rimed particles appear along an almost horizontal line in the triple-frequency space, which was not observed before. Overall, the three case studies indicate a close connection of triple-frequency signatures and snow particle structure, bulk snowfall density, and characteristic size of the particle size distribution.

This study uses snow events from the Biogenic Aerosols–Effects on Clouds and Climate (BAECC) 2014 campaign to investigate the connection between properties of snow and radar observations. The general hydrodynamic theory is applied to video-disdrometer measurements to retrieve masses of falling ice particles. Errors associated with the observation geometry and the measured particle size distribution (PSD) are addressed by devising a simple correction procedure. The value of the correction factor is determined by comparison of the retrieved precipitation accumulation with weighing-gauge measurements. Derived mass–dimensional relations are represented in the power-law form m = . It is shown that the retrieved prefactor am and exponent bm react to changes in prevailing microphysical processes. From the derived microphysical properties, event-specific relations between the equivalent reflectivity factor Ze and snowfall precipitation rate S (Ze = ) are determined. For the studied events, the prefactor of the Ze–S relation varied between 53 and 782 and the exponent was in the range of 1.19–1.61. The dependence of the factors azs and bzs on the m(D) relation and PSD are investigated. The exponent of the Ze–S relation mainly depends on the exponent of the m(D) relation, whereas the prefactor azs depends on both the intercept parameter N0 of the PSD and the prefactors of the m(D) and υ(D) relations. Changes in azs for a given N0 are shown to be linked to changes in liquid water path, which can be considered to be a proxy for degree of riming.

Abstract. In this study measurements collected during winters 2013/2014 and 2014/2015 at the University of Helsinki measurement station in Hyytiälä are used to investigate connections between ensemble mean snow density, particle fall velocity and parameters of the particle size distribution (PSD). The density of snow is derived from measurements of particle fall velocity and PSD, provided by a particle video imager, and weighing gauge measurements of precipitation rate. Validity of the retrieved density values is checked against snow depth measurements. A relation retrieved for the ensemble mean snow density and median volume diameter is in general agreement with previous studies, but it is observed to vary significantly from one winter to the other. From these observations, characteristic massdimensional relations of snow are retrieved. For snow rates more than 0.2 mm h −1 , a correlation between the intercept parameter of normalized gamma PSD and median volume diameter was observed.