Formation of contrails with anomalous backscattering: estimation of meteorological parameters

Results of the experiments on polarization laser sensing of aircraft contrails performed with the lidar developed at the National Research Tomsk State University are described. The altitudes of the lower and upper borders, backscattering phase matrices, optical thickness, and scattering ratios of the observed aerosol formations are determined. Microstructure parameters of the contrails are estimated by comparing the elements of backscattering phase matrices not only obtained from lidar experiments, but also calculated theoretically. The meteorological conditions for the formation of the preferred horizontal spatial orientation of ice crystals in contrails are established.