Geostrophic ocean currents and freshwater fluxes across the Canadian polar shelf via Nares Strait
Helen L. Johnson4, Andreas Münchow1 and Humfrey Melling5 This study discusses geostrophic ocean currents and fluxes through Nares Strait, one of the major straits connecting the Arctic Ocean to the North Atlantic across the Canadian polar shelf. Between 2003 and 2006, instruments were installed on s...
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| Language: | English |
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| Online Access: | http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.472.5363 http://blogs.earth.ox.ac.uk/~helenj/work/publications/Rabe_et_al_JMR2012.pdf |
| Summary: | Helen L. Johnson4, Andreas Münchow1 and Humfrey Melling5 This study discusses geostrophic ocean currents and fluxes through Nares Strait, one of the major straits connecting the Arctic Ocean to the North Atlantic across the Canadian polar shelf. Between 2003 and 2006, instruments were installed on subsea moorings to measure conductivity, temperature, pressure and velocity at high temporal and spatial resolution across the 400-m-deep strait. Here we present estimates of the variable volume and liquid freshwater fluxes, derived by geostrophic calculation, through the fraction of the cross section measured by the array. The array of conductivity-temperature recorders spanned 30 km of a 38-km-wide section between 30- and 200-m depth. This domain is 48 % of the total cross-sectional area, and 74 % of the cross-sectional area above 200-m depth. We demonstrate the importance of the seasonal alternation between land-fast and mobile-ice conditions, which has a strong influence on the structure of the geostrophic flow and the fluxes carried by it. The three-year mean geostrophic freshwater flux through the measured domain was 20 ± 3 mSv (relative to 34.8 psu) and no less than 28 mSv if extrapolated to the surface. No significant trend over |
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