scholarly journals Monitoring of the physical and mechanical state of sea ice and short-term prediction of extreme ice phenomena

2020 ◽  
Vol 66 (2) ◽  
pp. 162-179
Author(s):  
V. N. Smirnov ◽  
S. M. Kovalev ◽  
A. I. Shushlebin ◽  
N. V. Kolabutin ◽  
M. S. Znamenskiy

The article presents the results of studies that complement each other. New methods of instrumental studies of the physical and mechanical characteristics of ice and ice cover are considered.There is briefly described the complex system to developed in the AARI (Arctic and Antarctic research Institute) to determine the strength characteristics of ice formations in natural conditions. The results of determining the ice strength in wells (local strength) at the research station of AARI “Ice Base Cape of Baranov” are presented. The coefficient of comparison of local strength and strength of samples under uniaxial compression is obtained. This allows to determine the ice strength without sampling and testing of samples. On a large experimental material, linear and quadratic approximations for local ice strength were obtained. The influence of the indenter penetration rate on the local ice strength is studied.There is considered the application of the contact remote method for monitoring the dynamic state of the ice cover in order to obtain new data for creating a method of predicting the phenomena of compression and destruction of sea ice in real time.To study the large-scale mechanics of ice during dynamic processes in the air — ice — water system, a modular-block system for ice cover monitoring was developed. The layout of the system was tested in Arctic expeditions.The developed complex system for determining the strength characteristics of ice formations in natural conditions and the modular-block system for monitoring the state of the ice cover complement each other, suggest their further development and improvement, provide wide opportunities for ice research.

2018 ◽  
Vol 64 (2) ◽  
pp. 157-169
Author(s):  
V. V. Kharitonov ◽  
A. I. Shushlebin

In last two decade, studies of ice ridge morphometry and strength properties have been actively carried out. Thermal drilling of ice and experiments to determine the local strength of ice using a borehole jack are performed. The paper discusses the issues of joint use of thermal drilling equipment and borehole jack for the ice cover research. Two approaches to the comparison of the results obtained by these two methods are considered. Average penetration rate versus local ice strength dependences are presented. With increasing ice strength and decreasing penetration rate the interval of changes in the ice strength increases and correspondence of the strength to the penetration rate decreases. Based on the results of ice ridges research, depth-wise distributions of local strength and thermal drill penetration rate are compared. Difference between the average thicknesses of the consolidated layer obtained from these distributions was 5 %.


Ocean Science ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 14 (4) ◽  
pp. 617-632 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lauri Laakso ◽  
Santtu Mikkonen ◽  
Achim Drebs ◽  
Anu Karjalainen ◽  
Pentti Pirinen ◽  
...  

Abstract. The Utö Atmospheric and Marine Research Station introduced in this paper is located on Utö Island (59∘46.84′ N, 21∘22.13′ E) at the outer edge of the Archipelago Sea, by the Baltic Sea towards the Baltic Proper. Meteorological observations at the island started in 1881 and vertical profiling of seawater temperature and salinity in 1900. Since 1980, the number of observations at Utö has rapidly increased, with a large number of new meteorological, air quality, aerosol, optical and greenhouse gas parameters, and recently, a variety of marine observations. In this study, we analyze long-term changes of atmospheric temperature, cloudiness, sea salinity, temperature and ice cover. Our main dataset consists of 248 367 atmospheric temperature observations, 1632 quality-assured vertical seawater temperature and salinity profiles and 8565 ice maps, partly digitized for this project. We also use North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO), major Baltic inflow (MBI) and Baltic Sea river runoff data from the literature as reference variables to our data. Our analysis is based on a statistical method utilizing a dynamic linear model. The results show an increase in the atmospheric temperature at Utö, but the increase is significantly smaller than on land areas and has taken place only since the early 1980s, with a rate of 0.4 ∘C decade−1 during the last 35 years. We also see an increase in seawater temperatures, especially on the surface, with an increase of 0.3 ∘C decade−1 for the last 100 years. In deeper water layers, the increase is smaller and influenced by vertical mixing, which is modulated by inflow of saline water from the North Sea and freshwater inflow from rivers and by wind-driven processes influenced by the local bathymetry. The date when air temperature in the spring exceeds +5 ∘C became 5 days earlier from the period 1951–1980 to the period 1981–2010 and the date when sea surface water temperature exceeds +4 ∘C changed to 9 days earlier. Sea ice cover duration at Utö shows a decrease of approximately 50 % during the last 35 years. Based on the combined results, it is possible that the climate at Utö has changed into a new phase, in which the sea ice no longer reduces the local temperature increase caused by the global warming.


2016 ◽  
Vol 56 (4) ◽  
pp. 525-532 ◽  
Author(s):  
V. A. Borodkin ◽  
A. P. Makshtas ◽  
P. V. Bogorodsky

Field investigations of coastal fast ice near the research station Ice Base on the «Cape Baranova», carried out in 2013–2014, made possible to reveal a number of characteristics of the sea ice cover formation. It has been shown that during winter and early spring the sea ice thickness, being formed due to intensive snow drift and caused by that flooding of the ice cover just near the coast of the Bolshevik Island, substantially grows at its upper boundary, that is typical for the Antarctic seas. At the same time, similar process of the ice growth at a relatively short distance from the coast shows all features characteristic for the ice cover in the Arctic seas, and that is well reproduced by the conceptual numerical sea ice model. Thus, the region of the Ice Base «Cape Baranova» represents a natural laboratory for studying the processes of the sea ice formation in both, the Arctic and Antarctic seas under condition of the same atmospheric forcing. Transformation of the fast ice structure during the summer time is described. Results of the investigations has demonstrated that despite the radical changes in the structure thicknesses of the fast ice remained almost unchanged due to the ice growth on the bottom boundary of the ice cover until a destruction of it in August.


2020 ◽  
Vol 66 (3) ◽  
pp. 321-336
Author(s):  
V. N. Smirnov ◽  
S. M. Kovalev ◽  
A. A. Nubом ◽  
M. S. Znamenskiy

One of the main scientific and practical problems in the Arctic is the study of the dynamic state of the sea ice cover. The main parameters in the general model of drifting ice are the drift velocity vector, friction stress at the air-ice and ice-water interfaces, and the forces of dynamic interaction of ice fields. Establishing the connection between the large-scale processes in the atmosphere-ice-ocean system is necessary for developing methods of forecasting ice compression and ridging and the formation of local and extended fractures and leads, which help improve the existing climate models. The main aim is to obtain results of full-scale instrumental measurements of parameters of ice large-scale mechanics and dynamics, which provide a physical basis for explaining the nature of observed large-scale ice processes and allow one to perform physical parametrization. To accomplish this aim and evaluate the physicomechanical condition of the drifting ice cover of the Arctic Ocean, the “Transarktika-2019” expedition performed a real-time ice monitoring in April 2019. The investigation was conducted using seismometers and tiltmeters installed on the ice such that they formed a triangle with the sides measuring up to two kilometers. Data has been obtained on the wave and oscillation processes of crack formation, compression and ridging of ice. The possibilities of deciphering the initial data on the physics of wave and oscillatory processes in the icewater system considerably increase when using the known methods of processing seismic signals. With use of spectral Fourier analysis wavelet-transformation of oscillations significanlty extending possibilities of the seismic method at revelation of prognostic signs of crack formation and compression was applied. It is shown that the dynamics of ice processes can be connected with oceanic swell and tidal events. A possibility is created for obtaining new results in the investigation of large-scale mechanics of sea ice.


2019 ◽  
Vol 489 (6) ◽  
pp. 564-569
Author(s):  
V. P. Epifanov ◽  
K. E Sazonov

Two scenarios of the influence of standing waves on the strength properties of ice lying on the surface of the liquid are considered: in the process of freezing the ice field and as a result of instability, which is caused by compression on the pool walls due to the expansion of water during freezing. The obtained experimental hardness profiles of the ice field indicate the formation of periodic structures characteristic of the wave process. It is shown that in both cases the standing waves arising in the basin change the strength characteristics of the ice cover.


1997 ◽  
Vol 43 (143) ◽  
pp. 138-151 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. O. Jeffries ◽  
K. Morris ◽  
W.F. Weeks ◽  
A. P. Worby

AbstractSixty-three ice cores were collected in the Bellingshausen and Amundsen Seas in August and September 1993 during a cruise of the R.V. Nathaniel B. Palmer. The structure and stable-isotopic composition (18O/16O) of the cores were investigated in order to understand the growth conditions and to identify the key growth processes, particularly the contribution of snow to sea-ice formation. The structure and isotopic composition of a set of 12 cores that was collected for the same purpose in the Bellingshausen Sea in March 1992 are reassessed. Frazil ice and congelation ice contribute 44% and 26%, respectively, to the composition of both the winter and summer ice-core sets, evidence that the relatively calm conditions that favour congelation-ice formation are neither as common nor as prolonged as the more turbulent conditions that favour frazil-ice growth and pancake-ice formation. Both frazil- and congelation-ice layers have an av erage thickness of 0.12 m in winter, evidence that congelation ice and pancake ice thicken primarily by dynamic processes. The thermodynamic development of the ice cover relies heavily on the formation of snow ice at the surface of floes after sea water has flooded the snow cover. Snow-ice layers have a mean thickness of 0.20 and 0.28 m in the winter and summer cores, respectively, and the contribution of snow ice to the winter (24%) and summer (16%) core sets exceeds most quantities that have been reported previously in other Antarctic pack-ice zones. The thickness and quantity of snow ice may be due to a combination of high snow-accumulation rates and snow loads, environmental conditions that favour a warm ice cover in which brine convection between the bottom and top of the ice introduces sea water to the snow/ice interface, and bottom melting losses being compensated by snow-ice formation. Layers of superimposed ice at the top of each of the summer cores make up 4.6% of the ice that was examined and they increase by a factor of 3 the quantity of snow entrained in the ice. The accumulation of superimposed ice is evidence that melting in the snow cover on Antarctic sea-ice floes ran reach an advanced stage and contribute a significant amount of snow to the total ice mass.


1969 ◽  
Vol 35 ◽  
pp. 67-70 ◽  
Author(s):  
Niels Nørgaard-Pedersen ◽  
Sofia Ribeiro ◽  
Naja Mikkelsen ◽  
Audrey Limoges ◽  
Marit-Solveig Seidenkrantz

The marine record of the Independence–Danmark fjord system extending out to the Wandel Hav in eastern North Greenland (Fig. 1A) is little known due to the almost perennial sea-ice cover, which makes the region inaccessible for research vessels (Nørgaard-Pedersen et al. 2008), and only a few depth measurements have been conducted in the area. In 2015, the Villum Research Station, a new logistic base for scientific investigations, was opened at Station Nord. In contrast to the early exploration of the region, it is now possible to observe and track the seasonal character and changes of ice in the fjord system and the Arctic Ocean through remote sensing by satellite radar systems. Satellite data going back to the early 1980s show that the outer part of the Independence–Danmark fjord system is characterised by perennial sea ice whereas both the southern part of the fjord system and an area 20–30 km west of Station Nord are partly ice free during late summer (Fig. 1B). Hence, marine-orientated field work can be conducted from the sea ice using snow mobiles, and by drilling through the ice to reach the underlying water and sea bottom.


Author(s):  
Xiaoyi Shen ◽  
Chang-Qing Ke ◽  
Bin Cheng ◽  
Wentao Xia ◽  
Mengmeng Li ◽  
...  

AbstractIn August 2018, a remarkable polynya was observed off the north coast of Greenland, a perennial ice zone where thick sea ice cover persists. In order to investigate the formation process of this polynya, satellite observations, a coupled ice-ocean model, ocean profiling data, and atmosphere reanalysis data were applied. We found that the thinnest sea ice cover in August since 1978 (mean value of 1.1 m, compared to the average value of 2.8 m during 1978–2017) and the modest southerly wind caused by a positive North Atlantic Oscillation (mean value of 0.82, compared to the climatological value of −0.02) were responsible for the formation and maintenance of this polynya. The opening mechanism of this polynya differs from the one formed in February 2018 in the same area caused by persistent anomalously high wind. Sea ice drift patterns have become more responsive to the atmospheric forcing due to thinning of sea ice cover in this region.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document