Numerical Modeling Shows Increased Fracturing Due to Melt-Undercutting Prior to Major Calving at Bowdoin Glacier
Projections of future ice sheet mass loss and thus sea level rise rely on the parametrization of iceberg calving in ice sheet models. The interconnection between submarine melt-induced undercutting and calving is still poorly understood, which makes predicted contributions of tidewater glaciers to s...
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ftethz:oai:www.research-collection.ethz.ch:20.500.11850/430415 2023-05-15T16:21:10+02:00 Numerical Modeling Shows Increased Fracturing Due to Melt-Undercutting Prior to Major Calving at Bowdoin Glacier van Dongen, Eef Åström, Jan A. Jouvet, Guillaume Todd, Joe Benn, Douglas I. Funk, Martin 2020 application/application/pdf https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11850/430415 https://doi.org/10.3929/ethz-b-000430415 en eng Frontiers Media info:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/doi/10.3389/feart.2020.00253 info:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/wos/000556571000001 info:eu-repo/grantAgreement/SNF/Projektförderung in Mathematik, Natur- und Ingenieurwissenschaften (Abteilung II)/153179 http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11850/430415 doi:10.3929/ethz-b-000430415 info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International CC-BY Frontiers in Earth Science, 8 Glacier modeling Iceberg calving Numerical modeling Submarine melt Undercutting Crevasses Northwest Greenland info:eu-repo/semantics/article info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion 2020 ftethz https://doi.org/20.500.11850/430415 https://doi.org/10.3929/ethz-b-000430415 https://doi.org/10.3389/feart.2020.00253 2022-04-25T14:17:23Z Projections of future ice sheet mass loss and thus sea level rise rely on the parametrization of iceberg calving in ice sheet models. The interconnection between submarine melt-induced undercutting and calving is still poorly understood, which makes predicted contributions of tidewater glaciers to sea level rise uncertain. Here, we compare detailed 3-D simulations of fracture initiation obtained with the Helsinki Discrete Element Model (HiDEM) to observations, prior to a major calving event at Bowdoin Glacier, Northwest Greenland. Observations of a plume surfacing at the calving location suggest that local melt-undercutting influenced the size of the major calving event. Therefore, several experiments are conducted with various local and distributed (front-wide) undercut geometries. Although the number of undercut experiments is limited by computational requirements, one of the conjectured undercut geometries reproduces the crevasse leading to the observed major calving event in great detail. Our simulations show that undercutting leads to initiation of wider fractures more than 100 m upstream of the terminus, well-beyond the directly undercut region. When combining a moderate distributed undercut with local amplified undercuts at the two observed plumes, fracture initiation also increases in between the local undercuts. Thus, our results agree with previous studies suggesting the existence of a “calving amplifier” effect by submarine melt, both upglacier and across-glacier. Consequently, the simulations show the potentially large impact of submarine melt-induced undercutting on iceberg size. ISSN:2296-6463 Article in Journal/Newspaper glacier Greenland Ice Sheet Tidewater ETH Zürich Research Collection Bowdoin ENVELOPE(-69.317,-69.317,77.683,77.683) Greenland |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
ETH Zürich Research Collection |
op_collection_id |
ftethz |
language |
English |
topic |
Glacier modeling Iceberg calving Numerical modeling Submarine melt Undercutting Crevasses Northwest Greenland |
spellingShingle |
Glacier modeling Iceberg calving Numerical modeling Submarine melt Undercutting Crevasses Northwest Greenland van Dongen, Eef Åström, Jan A. Jouvet, Guillaume Todd, Joe Benn, Douglas I. Funk, Martin Numerical Modeling Shows Increased Fracturing Due to Melt-Undercutting Prior to Major Calving at Bowdoin Glacier |
topic_facet |
Glacier modeling Iceberg calving Numerical modeling Submarine melt Undercutting Crevasses Northwest Greenland |
description |
Projections of future ice sheet mass loss and thus sea level rise rely on the parametrization of iceberg calving in ice sheet models. The interconnection between submarine melt-induced undercutting and calving is still poorly understood, which makes predicted contributions of tidewater glaciers to sea level rise uncertain. Here, we compare detailed 3-D simulations of fracture initiation obtained with the Helsinki Discrete Element Model (HiDEM) to observations, prior to a major calving event at Bowdoin Glacier, Northwest Greenland. Observations of a plume surfacing at the calving location suggest that local melt-undercutting influenced the size of the major calving event. Therefore, several experiments are conducted with various local and distributed (front-wide) undercut geometries. Although the number of undercut experiments is limited by computational requirements, one of the conjectured undercut geometries reproduces the crevasse leading to the observed major calving event in great detail. Our simulations show that undercutting leads to initiation of wider fractures more than 100 m upstream of the terminus, well-beyond the directly undercut region. When combining a moderate distributed undercut with local amplified undercuts at the two observed plumes, fracture initiation also increases in between the local undercuts. Thus, our results agree with previous studies suggesting the existence of a “calving amplifier” effect by submarine melt, both upglacier and across-glacier. Consequently, the simulations show the potentially large impact of submarine melt-induced undercutting on iceberg size. ISSN:2296-6463 |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
van Dongen, Eef Åström, Jan A. Jouvet, Guillaume Todd, Joe Benn, Douglas I. Funk, Martin |
author_facet |
van Dongen, Eef Åström, Jan A. Jouvet, Guillaume Todd, Joe Benn, Douglas I. Funk, Martin |
author_sort |
van Dongen, Eef |
title |
Numerical Modeling Shows Increased Fracturing Due to Melt-Undercutting Prior to Major Calving at Bowdoin Glacier |
title_short |
Numerical Modeling Shows Increased Fracturing Due to Melt-Undercutting Prior to Major Calving at Bowdoin Glacier |
title_full |
Numerical Modeling Shows Increased Fracturing Due to Melt-Undercutting Prior to Major Calving at Bowdoin Glacier |
title_fullStr |
Numerical Modeling Shows Increased Fracturing Due to Melt-Undercutting Prior to Major Calving at Bowdoin Glacier |
title_full_unstemmed |
Numerical Modeling Shows Increased Fracturing Due to Melt-Undercutting Prior to Major Calving at Bowdoin Glacier |
title_sort |
numerical modeling shows increased fracturing due to melt-undercutting prior to major calving at bowdoin glacier |
publisher |
Frontiers Media |
publishDate |
2020 |
url |
https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11850/430415 https://doi.org/10.3929/ethz-b-000430415 |
long_lat |
ENVELOPE(-69.317,-69.317,77.683,77.683) |
geographic |
Bowdoin Greenland |
geographic_facet |
Bowdoin Greenland |
genre |
glacier Greenland Ice Sheet Tidewater |
genre_facet |
glacier Greenland Ice Sheet Tidewater |
op_source |
Frontiers in Earth Science, 8 |
op_relation |
info:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/doi/10.3389/feart.2020.00253 info:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/wos/000556571000001 info:eu-repo/grantAgreement/SNF/Projektförderung in Mathematik, Natur- und Ingenieurwissenschaften (Abteilung II)/153179 http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11850/430415 doi:10.3929/ethz-b-000430415 |
op_rights |
info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/20.500.11850/430415 https://doi.org/10.3929/ethz-b-000430415 https://doi.org/10.3389/feart.2020.00253 |
_version_ |
1766009183431294976 |