Resolved Gravity Waves in High-Resolution Nested UA-ICON Simulations Compared to Mesospheric Observations of the VortEx Campaign

We conducted high-resolution nested simulations over Andøya, Norway (ALOMAR) with UA-ICON to be co-analyzed with mesospheric measurements collected during the NASA Vorticity Experiment (VortEx) sounding rocket campaign in March 2023. The UA-ICON model was configured with 180 vertical levels, a model top at 150 km, and a global horizontal resolution of R2B7 (~20 km). One-way nesting was applied to achieve progressively finer resolutions of R2B8 (~10 km), R2B9 (~5 km), R2B10 (~2.5 km), and R2B11 (~1.25 km). For the global domain (~20 km horizontal resolution), the dynamic situation during the campaign is specified (specified dynamics, SD) by nudging to ECMWF operational analyses up to an altitude of 50 km. At resolutions finer than 5 km, UA-ICON resolves a significant portion of the gravity wave (GW) spectrum. Consequently, GW and convective parameterizations were disabled to isolate the effects of resolved GWs. Observational data from the campaign include wind measurements from the rocket flight, along with temperature and wind profiles up to ~80 km from the Rayleigh-Mie-Raman (RMR) lidar, and horizontal wind fields from the MF Saura and SIMONe Norway radar systems. We present and discuss initial results from comparisons between the simulations and the observations collected during the VortEx campaign. UA-ICON spectra exhibit the characteristic frequency spectrum of gravity waves, following the $\omega^{-2}$ relationship, validated by the observed Lidar spectrum. The simulations align well with observations, demonstrating UA-ICON's effectiveness in studying MLT dynamics.