SAFARI 2000: Airborne Trace Gas and Aerosol Data from Southern Africa

Southern Africa was the focus of an intensive airborne campaign from August 15 to September 7, 2000. The dataset contains measurements of atmospheric trace gases and aerosols collected during 28 flights by the South African Weather Bureau Aerocommander JRB. Instruments included analyzers for O3, SO2, CO, and NO, laser aerosol probes, and intermittent VOC canisters and nephelometers.

Use Cases

• Validating satellite retrievals (e.g., MOPITT) using in-situ CO flask measurements.
• Analyzing aerosol particle properties and extinction from laser probe and nephelometer data.
• Characterizing volatile organic compound (VOC) profiles over different land surface types from canister samples.
• Studying correlations between trace gases (O3, SO2, CO, NO) and aerosol loads during the dry season.

Strengths

• Contains data from a focused, 24-day intensive campaign with 28 separate flights, providing temporal density.
• Includes a core suite of instruments present on all flights, ensuring consistent measurement of key trace gases and aerosols.
• Features supplementary instruments for specific validation (CO flasks) and characterization (VOC canisters) tasks.

Limitations

• Critical metadata is missing, including column names, row counts, and specific data formats within the ZIP archives.
• Conflicting 'last updated' dates (2000 vs. 2026) across platforms create uncertainty about metadata maintenance.
• The license is ambiguously listed as 'other-license-specified' without details, complicating reuse.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Collection Method

Airborne measurements collected via instrumented Aerocommander aircraft.

Time Range

2000-08-15 to 2000-09-07

Freshness

2026-04-09 22:21:28.817937

Geography

Southern Africa