Baffin Bay sea ice inflow and outflow: 1978–1979 to 2016–2017

• Published in: The Cryosphere
• Main Authors: H. Bi, Z. Zhang, Y. Wang, X. Xu, Y. Liang, J. Huang, Y. Liu, M. Fu
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Copernicus Publications 2019
• Subjects: Environmental sciences; GE1-350; Geology; QE1-996.5; Baffin Bay; Lancaster Sound; Baffin; Sea ice; The Cryosphere
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-13-1025-2019; https://doaj.org/article/36c2266b5ce541338c9d8e3a9cf96e6e

Baffin Bay serves as a huge reservoir of sea ice which would provide the solid freshwater sources to the seas downstream. By employing satellite-derived sea ice motion and concentration fields, we obtain a nearly 40-year-long record (1978–1979 to 2016–2017) of the sea ice area flux through key fluxgates of Baffin Bay. Based on the estimates, the Baffin Bay sea ice area budget in terms of inflow and outflow are quantified and possible causes for its interannual variations and trends are analyzed. On average, the annual (September–August) inflows through the northern gate and Lancaster Sound are on the order of <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" id="M1" display="inline" overflow="scroll" dspmath="mathml"><mrow><mn mathvariant="normal">205.8</mn><mo>(</mo><mo>±</mo><mn mathvariant="normal">74.7</mn><mo>)</mo><mo>×</mo><msup><mn mathvariant="normal">10</mn><mn mathvariant="normal">3</mn></msup></mrow></math> <svg:svg xmlns:svg="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="94pt" height="15pt" class="svg-formula" dspmath="mathimg" md5hash="d70f40737eb8af314ae6297545c11d8a"><svg:image xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" xlink:href="tc-13-1025-2019-ie00001.svg" width="94pt" height="15pt" src="tc-13-1025-2019-ie00001.png"/></svg:svg> km 2 and <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" id="M3" display="inline" overflow="scroll" dspmath="mathml"><mrow><mn mathvariant="normal">55.2</mn><mo>(</mo><mo>±</mo><mn mathvariant="normal">17.8</mn><mo>)</mo><mo>×</mo><msup><mn mathvariant="normal">10</mn><mn mathvariant="normal">3</mn></msup></mrow></math> <svg:svg xmlns:svg="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="88pt" height="15pt" class="svg-formula" dspmath="mathimg" md5hash="87e1710333a5b7ad5554ea1139c3958d"><svg:image ...