Bellingshausen Sea bathymetric compilation ...

• Main Authors: Graham, Alastair G C, Nitsche, Frank-Oliver, Larter, Robert D
• Format: Dataset
• Language: English
• Published: PANGAEA 2011
• Subjects: Antarc*; Antarctica; Bellingshausen Sea; Ice Shelf; Ice Shelves; Sea ice; West Antarctica; Wilkins Ice Shelf
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.1594/pangaea.746255; https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.746255

The southern Bellingshausen Sea (SBS) is a rapidly-changing part of West Antarctica, where oceanic and atmospheric warming has led to the recent basal melting and break-up of the Wilkins ice shelf, the dynamic thinning of fringing glaciers, and sea-ice reduction. Accurate sea-floor morphology is vital for understanding the continued effects of each process upon changes within Antarctica's ice sheets. Here we present a new bathymetric grid for the SBS compiled from shipborne echo-sounder, spot-sounding and sub-ice measurements. The 1-km grid is the most detailed compilation for the SBS to-date, revealing large cross-shelf troughs, shallow banks, and deep inner-shelf basins that continue inland of coastal ice shelves. The troughs now serve as pathways which allow warm deep water to access the ice fronts in the SBS. Our dataset highlights areas still lacking bathymetric constraint, as well as regions for further investigation, including the likely routes of palaeo-ice streams. The new compilation is a major ... : zip-archive with two dataset formats included: ArcGIS ASCII Raster and NetCDF grid ...