This measuring system on the Lufthansa and KIT Airbus A350-900 aircraft includes sensors for high-frequency, high-precision measurement of pressure and temperature.
The Lufthansa Group and the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) have achieved a significant milestone in their unique project to convert a Lufthansa Airbus A350-900 into a flying research laboratory. Experts from the Lufthansa Group have successfully attached a measuring probe system to the lower fuselage of the A350, which was then tested in flight over southern Germany. This measuring system is the most complex of its kind and includes sensors for high-frequency and high-precision measurement of pressure and temperature.
The A350, named “Erfurt” and registered as D-AIXJ, will now be able to collect comprehensive climate data during regular passenger flights for the European research infrastructure IAGOS-CARIBIC.
Over the next few months, a measurement laboratory specially developed for the project will be set up, weighing around two tons. Some 20 measuring instruments will be installed in the laboratory, which will later be loaded into the cargo hold as a cargo container and connected to the measuring system on the outer fuselage of the aircraft. This high-tech laboratory will take off for the first time next year and collect climate data on selected flights in Lufthansa’s worldwide scheduled operations.
“We want to make flying more sustainable. That is why we have been supporting climate research for decades. The conversion of our Lufthansa Airbus A350 into a climate research aircraft is a globally unique project in which colleagues from a wide variety of areas at Lufthansa have been working together with partners in science for years. Our aim is to make a valuable contribution to climate research. The data that our aircraft will collect worldwide in the future will help to improve today’s atmospheric and climate models and thus their informative value for the future climate on earth,” says Jens Ritter, CEO, Lufthansa Airlines.
The laboratory continuously records more than 100 different trace gases, aerosol, and cloud parameters from the ground to the tropopause region at an altitude of nine to thirteen kilometers. What makes it special is that climate-relevant parameters can be recorded at this altitude with significantly higher accuracy and temporal resolution on board the aircraft than would be possible with satellite- or ground-based measurement systems.
“IAGOS-CARIBC helps to close an essential gap in our understanding of the climate system. With the high-precision measurements of many parameters, we can understand which atmospheric processes are changing and how in climate change, in an altitude region where most of the atmospheric radiation budget, i.e., the greenhouse effect, is generated and changed. We can thus identify process-specific errors and their causes in climate models and subsequently improve their predictive capabilities,” says Dr Andreas Zahn of KIT and coordinator of IAGOS-CARIBIC. “We are extremely grateful for Lufthansa’s great commitment and support,” he further added.
The conversion of the A350 “Erfurt” into a research laboratory was preceded by a planning and development phase lasting several years. In addition to the Lufthansa Group and KIT, six other companies (Lufthansa Technik, Airbus, Safran, enviscope, Dynatec, and ACC COLUMBIA Jet Service) are involved in the IAGOS-CARIBIC project. The KIT also acts as coordinator of a scientific consortium of currently twelve research institutions in Europe and the USA, whose complex measuring instruments will explore the atmosphere in the flying research laboratory.
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The Lufthansa Group has been committed to climate and weather research for almost 30 years and has equipped several aircraft with measuring instruments since then. From December 2004 to 2020, a Lufthansa Airbus A340-600 (registration D-AIHE) has already completed around 500 measurement flights in the service of climate and atmospheric research as part of the CARIBIC project.
