Glaciological investigations in the grounding line area of the Foundation Ice Stream, Antarctica

• Main Authors: Lambrecht, A., Mayer, Christoph, Hempel, L., Nixdorf, Uwe, Oerter, Hans
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: unknown
• Published: 1997
• Subjects: Ronne Ice Shelf; Foundation Ice Stream; Antarc*; Antarctica; Filchner Ronne Ice Shelf; Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf; Ice Shelf; Polarforschung
• Online Access: https://epic.awi.de/id/eprint/1854/; https://hdl.handle.net/10013/epic.12446

During the summer of 1994-95, an extensive program of glaciological, geophysical and geodetic measurements was carried out along a flow line of the Foundation Ice Stream. The collected data are the basis for mass flux determinations in the entrainment area of the ice stream into the RonneIce Shelf. In this paper, the collected data and first results are presented, including information about ice thickness, water column thickness and the uppermost layered sea bed in the grounding line area of the Foundation Ice Stream. In addition, airborne radio echo soundings (RES) were conducted over the southeastern part of the Ronne Ice Shelf gaining more widespread information about the ice thickness. The data derived from these different methods agree well. The radio echo sounding data indicate a position of the grounding line, which is some 40 km further south than expected. Therefore, the area of the Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf is about 1700 km2 larger than was previously thought.