Articles | Volume 25, issue 17
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-9859-2025
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-9859-2025
Research article
 | 
05 Sep 2025
Research article |  | 05 Sep 2025

Aerosol dynamic processes in the Hunga plume in January 2022: does water vapor accelerate aerosol aging?

Julia Bruckert, Simran Chopra, Richard Siddans, Charlotte Wedler, and Gholam Ali Hoshyaripour

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Cited articles

Abdelkader, M., Stenchikov, G., Pozzer, A., Tost, H., and Lelieveld, J.: The effect of ash, water vapor, and heterogeneous chemistry on the evolution of a Pinatubo-size volcanic cloud, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 23, 471–500, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-23-471-2023, 2023. a
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Short summary
The 2022 Hunga eruption emitted about 150 Tg of water vapor into the stratosphere. Here, we show that the water vapor injection not only accelerates SO2 oxidation and sulfate production but also increases the aging of ash (coating of ash by sulfate). Our study shows that aerosol aging alone does not explain the rapid loss of ash after the Hunga eruption as observed by satellite instruments. However, some ash might be masked in the observation due to the strong coating.
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