SGP/MPL/C1 - Signal degrading

The MPL viewport window was blown off during a storm on 2002/09/25.  The MPL received a 
soaking of rain.  Following this event, although site operations cleaned and dried the 
optics, the lidar performance continued to degrade over the next few months.  Although 
initially suitable for cloud detection, by Dec 10th the lidar was providing useful results only 
during the day (oddly enough).  By Jan 16, the detector was dead.  

It is not recommended to depend on night-time cloud base heights after Dec. 10 2002. 

It is not recommended to use any of the data after 9/25 for aerosol retrievals.

It is recommended to use the ARSCL data set for clouds since it also contains 

ceilometer and radar detected clouds.  For aerosol retrievals, the Raman Lidar is recommended.

• pulse_rep
• voltage_15
• detector_temp
• voltage_10
• laser_temp
• height
• filter_temp
• trigger_freq
• energy_monitor
• background_signal
• deadtime_correction
• laser_scalar_sync_offset
• range_bin_width
• scalar_sync_offset
• total_counts
• range_bins
• transceiver_altitude_angle
• time_offset
• max_altitude
• preliminary_cbh
• base_time
• shots_sum
• range_offset
• backscatter
• range_bin_time
• lon
• shots_summed
• voltage_05
• laser_sync_offset
• lat
• transceiver_azimuth_angle
• property
• alt
• range
• time
• instrument_temp

• shots_summed
• cloud_top_attenuation_flag
• pulse_rep
• energy_monitor
• alt
• detector_temp
• cloud_top_height
• lat
• laser_temp
• lon
• backscatter
• base_time
• baseline_update_time
• time_offset
• instrument_temp
• background_signal
• cloud_base_height
• random_error
• cloud_mask_2
• cloud_mask_1
• height