Met Office Cardington: humidity profiles, liquid water paths and integrated water vapour measurement from a RPG Humpro microwave radiometer, 2016-2024

The Met Office Observation-based research Boundary Layer Facility, at the semi-rural field site (18 Ha) of Cardington (52° 06′ N, 00° 25′ W, 29 m ± 1 m amsl) in central-southern England between 2004 and 2024, operated the RPG Humpro profiling microwave radiometer retrieving humidity profiles in addition to the liquid water paths and integrated water vapour paths using brightness temperatures measured at seven microwave frequencies between 22.24 and 31.4 GHz (this band in general being sensitive to water vapour and cloud). The liquid and vapour water path retrievals used a supplied neural network algorithm (which is trained with radiosonde data using a radiative transfer scheme). Two archived files are available, based on the time series (water vapour and liquid water) and profile (humidity) data.

A full list of NetCDF variables can be found in “A continuous hydrometeorological record (2004–2024) at the Met Office surface site of Cardington, UK.” Osborne et al. (2025). This paper should be referenced in any research/publications pertaining to this dataset.

To ensure optimal traceability and transparency of data, comprehensive metadata is included.