Deep convection in the Subpolar Gyre: Do we have enough data to estimate its intensity?

• Published in: Dynamics of Atmospheres and Oceans
• Main Authors: Fedorov, A.M., Bashmachnikov, I.L., Iakovleva, A.I., Kuznetsova, D.A., Raj, R.P.
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: 2023
• Subjects: Irminger Sea; Labrador Sea
• Online Access: https://www.vliz.be/imisdocs/publications/63/386663.pdf

Deep convection in the Subpolar Gyre (SPG) forms a link between the upper and lower limbs of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC). The intensity of convection in ocean studies is usually estimated using mixed layer depth (MLD). Here MLD is derived using vertical profiles of potential density from the gridded ARMOR3D dataset and from in situ observations of the EN4 dataset. Given limited areas of convective chimneys, the robustness of the estimates from an available set of vertical profiles needs to be verified before accessing mechanisms of interannual variability of deep convection. For reaching this goal, we first outlined three convection domains in the SPG with a high frequency of deep convection events: the southwestern Labrador Sea (L-DC), the central Irminger Sea (I-DC), and the area south of Cape Farewell (F-DC). The minimum number of randomly scattered casts, required to be executed from January to April for a robust estimate of the maximum MLD, depends on the typical area of the convective regions within the domain and forms 50 casts for L-DC, 40 casts for I-DC and 10 casts for F-DC. For the investigated convection domains, a sufficient number of casts were collected for several standalone winters of the late 1990s, while continuous time series of the convection intensity can be obtained only since the mid-2000s.