,,- FAAM Airborne Laboratory, National Centre for Atmospheric Science, Cranfield, United Kingdom of Great Britain – England, Scotland, Wales (patlakomiec@gmail.com)
The FAAM Airborne Laboratory is a national capability research facility dedicated to the advancement of atmospheric science, funded by the United Kingdom Research and Innovation agency. The facility employs 25 full time staff, composed of a multi-disciplinary team of instrumentation and data scientists.
The FAAM Airborne Laboratory and its partners from the university sector offers its users – academic and commercial – a complete package of support and access to state-of-the art measurement technology.
The FAAM aircraft is a specially adapted BAe-146-301 Atmospheric Research Aircraft designed to support atmospheric measurements for various applications, thanks to its configurable scientific payload.
We present FAAM's measurements capability for meteorology, greenhouse and reactive gases, aerosols, cloud physics, radiation and remote sensing. FAAM data scientists also support its users community by providing digital tools to guide missions, visualise online data, analyse and interpret observations.
Recent results from deployments of our airborne laboratory to study methane emissions from off- and on-shore oil and gas facilities, sulphur emissions from shipping, and aircraft emissions (air corridors NOx), including the first UK chase flight of a sustainable aviation fuelled aircraft, are summarised in this presentation. The calibration and evaluation of the EarthCARE satellite retrieval products performed by in-situ sampling in various cloud conditions was funded by ESA.
We finally present the concept of a digital twin to improve the operational flights of the FAAM aircraft, and the first results of an In-Situ Observations Simulator toolkit developed in collaboration with University partners to assimilate airborne observations in geophysical models.
For the past five years, the FAAM Airborne Laboratory has been undergoing a significant upgrade programme of its airframe, scientific infrastructure and services, to safeguard the UK’s research capability, provide frontier science capability and reduce our environmental impact. Some of the upgrades are presented.
How to cite: Lakomiec, P., Bauguitte, S., Kozhura, O., Sproson, D., and Woolley, A.: The FAAM Airborne Laboratory - The UK National Capability Research Infrastructure for Airborne Atmospheric Measurements, EGU General Assembly 2026, Vienna, Austria, 3–8 May 2026, EGU26-12369, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu26-12369, 2026.
