Modeling of biomass smoke injection into the lower stratosphere by a large forest fire (Part I): reference simulation

Abstract. Wildland fires in boreal regions have the potential to initiate deep convection, so-called pyro-convection, due to their release of sensible heat. Under favorable atmospheric conditions, large fires can result in pyro-convection that transports the emissions into the upper troposphere and the lower stratosphere. Here, we present three-dimensional model simulations of the injection of fire emissions into the lower stratosphere by pyro-convection. These model simulations are constrained and evaluated with observations obtained from the Chisholm fire in Alberta, Canada, in 2001. The active tracer high resolution atmospheric model (ATHAM) is initialized with observations obtained by r…