The article of record as published may be located at http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/jgrd.50878An aircraft field study (POST; Physics of Stratocumulus Top) was conducted off the
central California coast in July and August 2008 to deal with the known difficulty of
measuring entrainment rates in the radiatively important stratocumulus (Sc) prevalent in that
area. The Center for Interdisciplinary Remotely-Piloted Aircraft Studies Twin Otter
research aircraft flew 15 quasi-Lagrangian flights in unbroken Sc and carried a full
complement of probes including three high-data-rate probes: ultrafast temperature probe,
particulate volume monitor probe, and gust probe. The probes’ colocation near the nose of
the Twin Otter permitted estimation of entrainment fluxes and rates with an in-cloud
resolution of 1m. Results include the following: Application of the conditional sampling
variation of classical mixed layer theory for calculating the entrainment rate into cloud top
for POST flights is shown to be inadequate for most of the Sc. Estimated rates resemble
previous results after theory is modified to take into account both entrainment and
evaporation at cloud top given the strong wind shear and mixing at cloud top. Entrainment
rates show a tendency to decrease for large shear values, and the largest rates are for the
smallest temperature jumps across the inversion. Measurements indirectly suggest that
entrained parcels are primarily cooled by infrared flux divergence rather than cooling from
droplet evaporation, while detrainment at cloud top causes droplet evaporation and cooling
in the entrainment interface layer above cloud top.NSF supported H. Gerber, G. Frick, and S. Malinowski (ATM-0735121, AGS-1020445), D. Khelif (ATM-0734323), and S. Krueger (ATM-0735118). The Office of Naval Research and the Naval Postgraduate School supported in part the deployment of the Twin Otter aircraft