Coordinated Eastern Arctic Research Experiment (CEAREX)

• Main Author: Colony, Roger
• Other Authors: WASHINGTON UNIV SEATTLE POLAR SCIENCE CENTER
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: 1992
• Subjects: Snow; Ice and Permafrost; *FLUX(RATE); *SEA ICE; *ARCTIC OCEAN; STOCHASTIC PROCESSES; PRODUCTION; ENERGY; PROBABILITY DENSITY FUNCTIONS; ESTIMATES; DRIFT; TEMPERATURE GRADIENTS; FREEZING; VERTICAL ORIENTATION; GEOMETRIC FORMS; BALANCE; DATA ACQUISITION; OCEANS; GEOGRAPHIC AREAS; HEAT FLUX; CONDUCTION(HEAT TRANSFER); INTERNAL WAVES; ARCTIC REGIONS; EAST(DIRECTION); OCEANOGRAPHY; ICEBERGS; THICKNESS; TEMPERATURE; MATHEMATICAL MODELS; MEASUREMENT; CEAREX(COORDINATED EASTERN ARCTIC RESEARCH EXPERIMENT); IDAP(ICE DATA ACQUISITION PROGRAM); SPITZBERGEN; Arctic; Arctic Ocean; Svalbard; Ice; Iceberg*; permafrost; Sea ice; Spitzbergen
• Online Access: http://www.dtic.mil/docs/citations/ADA245731; http://oai.dtic.mil/oai/oai?&verb=getRecord&metadataPrefix=html&identifier=ADA245731

CEAREX consisted of three separate studies: oceanic heat flux at the ice-ocean interface, ice-draft topography, and the Ice Data Acquisition Project (IDAP). To estimate the oceanic heat flux at the ice-ocean interface, we monitored 12 sites on a single, multiyear sea-ice floe drifting in the Arctic Ocean northeast of Svalbard. At each site, we measured (1) the vertical temperature gradient through the sea ice to estimate the conductive heat flux at the ice-ocean interface and (2) the change in ice thickness to estimate the heat flux associated with the melting and freezing at the ice-ocean interface. The oceanic heat flux was deduced as a residual of the total energy balance at the ice-ocean interface. An experiment on a multiyear ice floe in the eastern Arctic Ocean to study internal waves and other small-scale oceanographic features was undertaken because interpretation of some of the oceanographic measurements was expected to depend on the geometric configuration of the ice draft. The Ice Data Acquisition Program tested equipment for measuring temperatures and energy fluxes at the snow-ice and ice-ocean interfaces. A stochastic model of iceberg production, drift, and grounding was developed to estimate probability density functions for the number of icebergs likely to be found in a prescribed geographical region.