Drifting snow statistics from multiple-year autonomous measurements in Adelie Land, eastern Antarctica

• Main Author: Amory, Charles
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: 2019
• Subjects: Antarctic; East Antarctica; The Antarctic; Adelie Land; Antarc*; Antarctica; Ice Sheet
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-2019-164; https://www.the-cryosphere-discuss.net/tc-2019-164/

Drifting snow is a widespread feature over the Antarctic ice sheet whose climatological and hydrological significances at the continental scale have been consequently investigated through modelling and satellite approaches. While field measurements are needed to evaluate and interpret model and punctual satellite products, most drifting snow observation campaigns in Antarctica involved data collected at a single location and over short time periods. With the aim of acquiring new data relevant to the observations and modelling of drifting snow in Antarctic conditions, two remote locations in coastal Adelie Land (East Antarctica) 100 km apart were instrumented in January 2010 with meteorological and second-generation IAV Engineering acoustic FlowCapt TM sensors. The data provided nearly continuously so far constitutes the longest dataset of autonomous near-surface (i.e., below 2 m) measurements of drifting snow currently available over the Antarctic continent. This paper presents an assessment of drifting snow occurrences and snow mass transport from up to 9 years (2010–2018) of half-hourly observational records collected in one of the Antarctic regions most prone to snow transport by wind. The dataset is freely available to the scientific community and can be used to complement satellite products and evaluate snow-transport models close to the surface and at high temporal frequency.