In-situ observations at the ice-water boundary of floating growlers in Hornsund Fjord, Svalbard (2022)

• Main Authors: Hayden Johnson, Oskar Glowacki, Grant Deane, Dale Stokes
• Format: Dataset
• Language: unknown
• Published: Arctic Data Center 2023
• Subjects: submarine melting; ice-ocean interactions; Hansbreen; Hornsund; Svalbard; glacier
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.18739/A2JS9H92P

This dataset contains example data collected during the development of a method to make in-situ measurements at the ice-water boundary of floating growlers. The method involves attaching instruments to the ice with ice screws and a modular structure of tubes and clamps. There are three types of data included: 1) Temperature measurements made using a custom-built array of thermistors that was positioned orthogonal to the ice face; 2) video of the ice face in which bubbles in the ice and rising through the water are clearly visible; and 3) acoustic data recorded with a hydrophone placed a few centimeters from the ice face. The video and acoustic data were collected simultaneously. The data presented here are intended primarily as a demonstration of feasibility. This type of data provides an opportunity to study sub-meter scale processes that occur at vertical boundaries of glacier ice and fjord water in the field. Improving understanding of these processes is important for understanding submarine melting at glacier termini, which remains difficult to measure and quantify. More sophisticated measurements made with a similar platform may also provide an opportunity to directly test the performance of existing parameterizations of submarine melting.