| Summary: | International audience A surface mass balance (SMB) observatory is deployed in Adélie Land and annually surveyed. Results from 8 years of observation were recently compared with meteorological and climate models. In situ Surface Mass Balance (SMB) reports, models, satellite images and GPR surveys all suggest that blowing snow removes a significant part of the annual precipitation in Antarctica and as such is a most important component of the Antarctic SMB. The MAR (Modèle Atmosphérique Regional) model is able to reproduce the fact that blowing snow processes significantly affect the SMB of Antarctica. However, there are very few field observations of blowing snow available to directly verify and calibrate the model. With logistical support by the French polar institute (IPEV) and instrumental funding by ICE2SEA, a field campaign was launch last year to acquire new, more model-validation-oriented observations. One year of blowing snow observation will be described and analyzed. The flux of drifting and blowing snow is clearly decreasing with the height near the coast and 100km inland. A first comparison of blowing snow gauge and meteorological data with MAR for January 2010 will be presented.
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