Observations and simulations of new snow density in the drifting snow-dominated environment of Antarctica

• Published in: Journal of Glaciology
• Main Authors: Nander Wever, Eric Keenan, Charles Amory, Michael Lehning, Armin Sigmund, Hendrik Huwald, Jan T. M. Lenaerts
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Cambridge University Press 2023
• Subjects: Polar firn; snow/ice surface processes; wind-blown snow; Environmental sciences; GE1-350; Meteorology. Climatology; QC851-999; Dronning Maud Land; East Antarctica; Antarc*; Antarctica; Journal of Glaciology
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.1017/jog.2022.102; https://doaj.org/article/b984331f2f354fa787fd3d71b1a7127a

Owing to drifting snow processes, snow accumulation and surface density in polar environments are variable in space and time. We present new field data of manual measurements, repeat terrestrial laser scanning and snow micro-penetrometry from Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica, showing the density of new snow accumulations. We combine these data with published drifting snow mass flux observations, to evaluate the performance of the 1-D, detailed, physics-based snow cover model SNOWPACK in representing drifting snow and surface density. For two sites in East Antarctica with multiple years of data, we found a coefficient of determination for the simulated drifting snow of r2 = 0.42 and r2 = 0.50, respectively. The field observations show the existence of low-density snow accumulations during low wind conditions. Successive high wind speed events generally erode these low-density layers while producing spatially variable erosion/deposition patterns with typical length scales of a few metres. We found that a model setup that is able to represent low-density snow accumulating during low wind speed conditions, as well as subsequent snow erosion and redeposition at higher densities during drifting snow events was mostly able to describe the observed temporal variability of surface density in the field.