Articles | Volume 25, issue 12
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-6353-2025
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-6353-2025
Research article
 | 
26 Jun 2025
Research article |  | 26 Jun 2025

The optical properties of the stratospheric aerosol layer perturbation of the Hunga Tonga–Hunga Ha'apai volcano eruption of 15 January 2022

Pasquale Sellitto, Redha Belhadji, Bernard Legras, Aurélien Podglajen, and Clair Duchamp

Related authors

Aerosol Composition and Extinction of the 2022 Hunga Plume Using CALIOP
Clair Duchamp, Bernard Legras, Aurélien Podglajen, Pasquale Sellitto, Adam E. Bourassa, Alexei Rozanov, Ghassan Taha, and Daniel J. Zawada
Atmos. Meas. Tech., 19, 1675–1696, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-19-1675-2026,https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-19-1675-2026, 2026
Short summary
Mid- and far-infrared spectral signatures of mineral dust from low- to high-latitude regions: significance and implications
Claudia Di Biagio, Elisa Bru, Avila Orta, Servanne Chevaillier, Clarissa Baldo, Antonin Bergé, Mathieu Cazaunau, Sandra Lafon, Sophie Nowak, Edouard Pangui, Meinrat O. Andreae, Pavla Dagsson-Waldhauserova, Kebonyethata Dintwe, Konrad Kandler, James S. King, Amelie Chaput, Gregory S. Okin, Stuart Piketh, Thuraya Saeed, David Seibert, Zongbo Shi, Earle Williams, Pasquale Sellitto, and Paola Formenti
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 26, 1079–1091, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-26-1079-2026,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-26-1079-2026, 2026
Short summary
Early evolution of the ozone mini-hole generated by the Australian bushfires 2019–2020 observed from satellite and ground-based instruments
Redha Belhadji, Pasquale Sellitto, Maxim Eremenko, Silvia Bucci, Tran M. Nguyet, Martin Schwell, and Bernard Legras
Atmos. Meas. Tech., 18, 7465–7476, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-18-7465-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-18-7465-2025, 2025
Short summary
The sensitivity of the Far-infrared Outgoing Radiation Understanding and Monitoring (FORUM) mission to dust aerosols: a pseudo-observations analysis
Pasquale Sellitto, Maxim Eremenko, Paola Formenti, Perla Alalam, Michael Höpfner, and Claudia Di Biagio
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2025-5858,https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2025-5858, 2025
Short summary
Decadal tropospheric ozone radiative forcing estimations with offline radiative modelling and IAGOS aircraft observations
Pasquale Sellitto, Audrey Gaudel, and Bastien Sauvage
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 25, 13299–13309, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-13299-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-13299-2025, 2025
Short summary

Cited articles

AERIS: GEISA: spectroscopic database, http://cds-espri.ipsl.fr/GEISA/AEROSOLS/geisaAerosols.php, last access: 18 June 2025. 
Asano, S.: Estimation of the size distribution of Pinatubo volcanic dust from Bishop's ring simulations, Geophys. Res. Lett., 20, 447–450, https://doi.org/10.1029/93GL00512, 1993. 
Asher, E., Todt, M., Rosenlof, K., Thornberry, T., Gao, R., Taha, G., Walter, P., Alvarez, S., Flynn, J., Davis, S. M., Evan, S., Brioude, J., Metzger, J., Hurst, D. F., Hall, E., and Xiong, K.: Unexpectedly rapid aerosol formation in the Hunga Tonga plume, P. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, 120, e2219547120, https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2219547120, 2023. 
Carn, S. A., Krotkov, N. A., Fisher, B. L., and Li, C.: Out of the blue: Volcanic SO2 emissions during the 2021–2022 eruptions of Hunga Tonga – Hunga Ha'apai (Tonga), Front. Earth Sci., 10, 976962, https://doi.org/10.3389/feart.2022.976962, 2022. 
Carr, J. L., Horvath, A., Wu, D. L., and Friberg, M. D.: Stereo Plume Height and Motion Retrievals for the Record-Setting Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai Eruption of 15 January 2022, Geophys. Res. Lett., 49, e2022GL098131, https://doi.org/10.1029/2022GL098131, 2022. 
Download
Short summary
The Hunga Tonga–Hunga Ha’apai volcano erupted on 15 January 2022, producing the largest stratospheric aerosol perturbation of the last 30 years. Stratospheric volcanic aerosols usually produce a transient climate cooling; these impacts depend on volcanic aerosol composition/size, due to size-dependent interactions with solar/terrestrial radiation. We demonstrate that the Hunga Tonga–Hunga Ha’apai stratospheric aerosols have a larger cooling potential per unit mass than the past climate-relevant El Chichón (1984) and Pinatubo (1991) eruptions.
Share
Altmetrics
Final-revised paper
Preprint