scholarly journals Tensile fracture of a single crack in first-year sea ice

Author(s):  
J. P. Dempsey ◽  
D. M. Cole ◽  
S. Wang

The break-up of sea ice in the Arctic and Antarctic has been studied during three field trips in the spring of 1993 at Resolute, NWT, and the fall of 2001 and 2004 on McMurdo Sound via in situ cyclic loading and fracture experiments. In this paper, the back-calculated fracture information necessary to the specification of an accurate viscoelastic fictitious (cohesive) crack model is presented. In particular, the changing shape of the stress separation curve with varying conditions and loading scenarios is revealed. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Modelling of sea-ice phenomena’.

2015 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 255-268 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. V. Divine ◽  
M. A. Granskog ◽  
S. R. Hudson ◽  
C. A. Pedersen ◽  
T. I. Karlsen ◽  
...  

Abstract. The paper presents a case study of the regional (≈150 km) morphological and optical properties of a relatively thin, 70–90 cm modal thickness, first-year Arctic sea ice pack in an advanced stage of melt. The study combines in situ broadband albedo measurements representative of the four main surface types (bare ice, dark melt ponds, bright melt ponds and open water) and images acquired by a helicopter-borne camera system during ice-survey flights. The data were collected during the 8-day ICE12 drift experiment carried out by the Norwegian Polar Institute in the Arctic, north of Svalbard at 82.3° N, from 26 July to 3 August 2012. A set of > 10 000 classified images covering about 28 km2 revealed a homogeneous melt across the study area with melt-pond coverage of ≈ 0.29 and open-water fraction of ≈ 0.11. A decrease in pond fractions observed in the 30 km marginal ice zone (MIZ) occurred in parallel with an increase in open-water coverage. The moving block bootstrap technique applied to sequences of classified sea-ice images and albedo of the four surface types yielded a regional albedo estimate of 0.37 (0.35; 0.40) and regional sea-ice albedo of 0.44 (0.42; 0.46). Random sampling from the set of classified images allowed assessment of the aggregate scale of at least 0.7 km2 for the study area. For the current setup configuration it implies a minimum set of 300 images to process in order to gain adequate statistics on the state of the ice cover. Variance analysis also emphasized the importance of longer series of in situ albedo measurements conducted for each surface type when performing regional upscaling. The uncertainty in the mean estimates of surface type albedo from in situ measurements contributed up to 95% of the variance of the estimated regional albedo, with the remaining variance resulting from the spatial inhomogeneity of sea-ice cover.


2014 ◽  
Vol 11 (5) ◽  
pp. 7485-7519 ◽  
Author(s):  
N.-X. Geilfus ◽  
R. J. Galley ◽  
O. Crabeck ◽  
T. Papakyriakou ◽  
J. Landy ◽  
...  

Abstract. Melt pond formation is a common feature of the spring and summer Arctic sea ice. However, the role of the melt ponds formation and the impact of the sea ice melt on both the direction and size of CO2 flux between air and sea is still unknown. Here we describe the CO2-carbonate chemistry of melting sea ice, melt ponds and the underlying seawater associated with measurement of CO2 fluxes across first year landfast sea ice in the Resolute Passage, Nunavut, in June 2012. Early in the melt season, the increase of the ice temperature and the subsequent decrease of the bulk ice salinity promote a strong decrease of the total alkalinity (TA), total dissolved inorganic carbon (TCO2) and partial pressure of CO2 (pCO2) within the bulk sea ice and the brine. Later on, melt pond formation affects both the bulk sea ice and the brine system. As melt ponds are formed from melted snow the in situ melt pond pCO2 is low (36 μatm). The percolation of this low pCO2 melt water into the sea ice matrix dilutes the brine resulting in a strong decrease of the in situ brine pCO2 (to 20 μatm). As melt ponds reach equilibrium with the atmosphere, their in situ pCO2 increase (up to 380 μatm) and the percolation of this high concentration pCO2 melt water increase the in situ brine pCO2 within the sea ice matrix. The low in situ pCO2 observed in brine and melt ponds results in CO2 fluxes of −0.04 to −5.4 mmol m–2 d–1. As melt ponds reach equilibrium with the atmosphere, the uptake becomes less significant. However, since melt ponds are continuously supplied by melt water their in situ pCO2 still remains low, promoting a continuous but moderate uptake of CO2 (~ −1mmol m–2 d–1). The potential uptake of atmospheric CO2 by melting sea ice during the Arctic summer has been estimated from 7 to 16 Tg of C ignoring the role of melt ponds. This additional uptake of CO2 associated to Arctic sea ice needs to be further explored and considered in the estimation of the Arctic Ocean's overall CO2 budget.


2018 ◽  
Vol 35 (11) ◽  
pp. 2147-2157
Author(s):  
E. Yoshizawa ◽  
K. Shimada ◽  
K. H. Cho

AbstractFirst-year ice has replaced multiyear ice in the Northern Sea Route area since 2008. In this area, sea ice survival during summer substantially depends on first-year ice thickness at melt onset, and thus monitoring of first-year ice thickness in the freezing period is a key to forecasting sea ice distributions in the following summer. In this paper we introduce a new algorithm to estimate flat first-year ice draft using brightness temperature data measured by the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer-2 (AMSR2). The algorithm uses a gradient ratio (GR) of 18- and 36-GHz vertically polarized brightness temperatures based on decreases in sea ice emissivity in higher AMSR2 frequency channels with thermodynamic growth associated with an increase in volume scattering. Such spectral characteristics of the emissivity are examined by comparing GR values with flat first-year ice draft extracted by mode values of in situ draft data measured by a moored ice profiling sonar. The accuracy of the daily draft estimated from GR values after applying proper noise filters is about 10 cm for a draft range of 0.4–1.2 m.


2015 ◽  
Vol 12 (6) ◽  
pp. 2047-2061 ◽  
Author(s):  
N.-X. Geilfus ◽  
R. J. Galley ◽  
O. Crabeck ◽  
T. Papakyriakou ◽  
J. Landy ◽  
...  

Abstract. Melt pond formation is a common feature of spring and summer Arctic sea ice, but the role and impact of sea ice melt and pond formation on both the direction and size of CO2 fluxes between air and sea is still unknown. Here we report on the CO2–carbonate chemistry of melting sea ice, melt ponds and the underlying seawater as well as CO2 fluxes at the surface of first-year landfast sea ice in the Resolute Passage, Nunavut, in June 2012. Early in the melt season, the increase in ice temperature and the subsequent decrease in bulk ice salinity promote a strong decrease of the total alkalinity (TA), total dissolved inorganic carbon (TCO2) and partial pressure of CO2 (pCO2) within the bulk sea ice and the brine. As sea ice melt progresses, melt ponds form, mainly from melted snow, leading to a low in situ melt pond pCO2 (36 μatm). The percolation of this low salinity and low pCO2 meltwater into the sea ice matrix decreased the brine salinity, TA and TCO2, and lowered the in situ brine pCO2 (to 20 μatm). This initial low in situ pCO2 observed in brine and melt ponds results in air–ice CO2 fluxes ranging between −0.04 and −5.4 mmol m−2 day−1 (negative sign for fluxes from the atmosphere into the ocean). As melt ponds strive to reach pCO2 equilibrium with the atmosphere, their in situ pCO2 increases (up to 380 μatm) with time and the percolation of this relatively high concentration pCO2 meltwater increases the in situ brine pCO2 within the sea ice matrix as the melt season progresses. As the melt pond pCO2 increases, the uptake of atmospheric CO2 becomes less significant. However, since melt ponds are continuously supplied by meltwater, their in situ pCO2 remains undersaturated with respect to the atmosphere, promoting a continuous but moderate uptake of CO2 (~ −1 mmol m−2 day−1) into the ocean. Considering the Arctic seasonal sea ice extent during the melt period (90 days), we estimate an uptake of atmospheric CO2 of −10.4 Tg of C yr−1. This represents an additional uptake of CO2 associated with Arctic sea ice that needs to be further explored and considered in the estimation of the Arctic Ocean's overall CO2 budget.


2014 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 3699-3732
Author(s):  
D. V. Divine ◽  
M. A. Granskog ◽  
S. R. Hudson ◽  
C. A. Pedersen ◽  
T. I. Karlsen ◽  
...  

Abstract. The paper presents a case study of the regional (≈ 150 km) broadband albedo of first year Arctic sea ice in advanced stages of melt, estimated from a combination of in situ albedo measurements and aerial imagery. The data were collected during the eight day ICE12 drift experiment carried out by the Norwegian Polar Institute in the Arctic north of Svalbard at 82.3° N from 26 July to 3 August 2012. The study uses in situ albedo measurements representative of the four main surface types: bare ice, dark melt ponds, bright melt ponds and open water. Images acquired by a helicopter borne camera system during ice survey flights covered about 28 km2. A subset of > 8000 images from the area of homogeneous melt with open water fraction of ≈ 0.11 and melt pond coverage of ≈ 0.25 used in the upscaling yielded a regional albedo estimate of 0.40 (0.38; 0.42). The 95% confidence interval on the estimate was derived using the moving block bootstrap approach applied to sequences of classified sea ice images and albedo of the four surface types treated as random variables. Uncertainty in the mean estimates of surface type albedo from in situ measurements contributed some 95% of the variance of the estimated regional albedo, with the remaining variance resulting from the spatial inhomogeneity of sea ice cover. The results of the study are of relevance for the modeling of sea ice processes in climate simulations. It particularly concerns the period of summer melt, when the optical properties of sea ice undergo substantial changes, which existing sea ice models have significant diffuculty accurately reproducing.


2017 ◽  
Vol 59 (76pt2) ◽  
pp. 181-190 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas J. Ballinger ◽  
Edward Hanna ◽  
Richard J. Hall ◽  
Thomas E. Cropper ◽  
Jeffrey Miller ◽  
...  

ABSTRACTThe Arctic marine environment is undergoing a transition from thick multi-year to first-year sea-ice cover with coincident lengthening of the melt season. Such changes are evident in the Baffin Bay-Davis Strait-Labrador Sea (BDL) region where melt onset has occurred ~8 days decade−1 earlier from 1979 to 2015. A series of anomalously early events has occurred since the mid-1990s, overlapping a period of increased upper-air ridging across Greenland and the northwestern North Atlantic. We investigate an extreme early melt event observed in spring 2013. (~6σ below the 1981–2010 melt climatology), with respect to preceding sub-seasonal mid-tropospheric circulation conditions as described by a daily Greenland Blocking Index (GBI). The 40-days prior to the 2013 BDL melt onset are characterized by a persistent, strong 500 hPa anticyclone over the region (GBI >+1 on >75% of days). This circulation pattern advected warm air from northeastern Canada and the northwestern Atlantic poleward onto the thin, first-year sea ice and caused melt ~50 days earlier than normal. The episodic increase in the ridging atmospheric pattern near western Greenland as in 2013, exemplified by large positive GBI values, is an important recent process impacting the atmospheric circulation over a North Atlantic cryosphere undergoing accelerated regional climate change.


2017 ◽  
Vol 44 (17) ◽  
pp. 8971-8978 ◽  
Author(s):  
K. Campbell ◽  
C. J. Mundy ◽  
M. Gosselin ◽  
J. C. Landy ◽  
A. Delaforge ◽  
...  

Water ◽  
2022 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 145
Author(s):  
Jian Liu ◽  
Liyang Zhan ◽  
Qingkai Wang ◽  
Man Wu ◽  
Wangwang Ye ◽  
...  

Nitrous oxide (N2O) is the third most important greenhouse gas in the atmosphere, and the ocean is an important source of N2O. As the Arctic Ocean is strongly affected by global warming, rapid ice melting can have a significant impact on the N2O pattern in the Arctic environment. To better understand this impact, N2O concentration in ice core and underlying seawater (USW) was measured during the seventh Chinese National Arctic Research Expedition (CHINARE2016). The results showed that the average N2O concentration in first-year ice (FYI) was 4.5 ± 1.0 nmol kg−1, and that in multi-year ice (MYI) was 4.8 ± 1.9 nmol kg−1. Under the influence of exchange among atmosphere-sea ice-seawater systems, brine dynamics and possible N2O generation processes at the bottom of sea ice, the FYI showed higher N2O concentrations at the bottom and surface, while lower N2O concentrations were seen inside sea ice. Due to the melting of sea ice and biogeochemical processes, USW presented as the sink of N2O, and the saturation varied from 47.2% to 102.2%. However, the observed N2O concentrations in USW were higher than that of T-N2OUSW due to the sea–air exchange, diffusion process, possible N2O generation mechanism, and the influence of precipitation, and a more detailed mechanism is needed to understand this process in the Arctic Ocean.


1987 ◽  
Vol 33 (113) ◽  
pp. 105-119 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. Gabison

AbstractThe formulation and application of a onedimensional sea-ice thermodynamic model is presented in this paper. The model’s sensitivity to changes in oceanic and atmospheric parameters is analyzed and compared with previous studies. The model is next applied to three locations in the Arctic: Cambridge Bay, Frobisher Bay, and Alert Inlet to study the model’s ability to simulate the annual cycle of first-year ice. The model’s results are compared with available climatological data and discussed in terms of the main thermodynamic processes, the combined effects of oceanic tides, and of sea-ice deterioration by melting on the break-up of sea ice.It is shown that the model is effective in simulating the climatology of the first-year ice thickness at the three Arctic locations. The study also suggests that improved model performance can be expected from additional research and application of flexural forcing of the ice by waves and tides, and of deterioration of ice strength during the melting process.


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