Long-Term Infrasonic Monitoring of Land and Marine-Terminating Glaciers in Greenland

• Published in: Geophysical Research Letters
• Main Authors: Evers, L. G., Smets, P. S. M., Assink, J. D., Shani-Kadmiel, S., Kondo, K., Sugiyama, S.
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: American Geophysical Union
• Subjects: infrasound; glacier; Greenland; CTBT; seismo-acoustics; 452; Arctic; Qaanaaq
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/2115/87040; https://doi.org/10.1029/2021GL097113

A period of 18 years of infrasonic recordings was analyzed from a microbarometer array (I18DK) in northwestern Greenland, near Qaanaaq. A huge number of infrasonic detections, over 700,000, have been made in I18DKs soundscape during the Arctic summers. Simultaneously identified were both calving events from marine-terminating glaciers and discharge related acoustics from a land-terminating glacier. This infrasonic activity is correlated to sea-surface and atmospheric temperature, respectively. Inter-yearly to daily variations were retrieved showing a strong variability in infrasonic detection rates and hence glacier activity. The highest number of infrasonic detections were found in recent years from the land-terminating glacier. The latter is supported by actual discharge measurements and partly by a discharge model. It is concluded that monitoring infrasound from glaciers can complement other techniques to remotely and passively get insights into glacier dynamics with high temporal and spatial resolution.