Daily Summary for 4 December 2006

The low that passed through the area yesterday moved off the coast of New England overnight. Low level instability, combined with the recent rain and snow, provided low-level stratocumulus, which aligned themselves into "cloud streets" over most of the area. Some of these provided brief snow showers to Ottawa. The mid- and upper levels were dry and clear until late in the day, when the next low brought in cirrus deepening to altostratus on it's leading edge.

As with each IOP, there is a 24 hour period with two potential CloudSat overpasses to target. One is a ~13:30 LT ascending overpass near Trois-Riviers, QC, the other is a ~1:30 LT descending overpass near CARE. Since pilot flight time restrictions prevent us from flying both, the decision was made to go for the nighttime CARE flight early tomorrow AM rather than this afternoon's Trois-Riviers flight.