Results of a Finite-Element Sea-Ice Ocean Model (FESOM) set-up to study the interannual to decadal variability in the deep-water formation rates

• Main Authors: Scholz, Patrick, Lohmann, Gerrit, Wang, Qiang, Danilov, Sergey
• Format: Dataset
• Language: English
• Published: PANGAEA 2013
• Subjects: File format; File name; File size; Uniform resource locator/link to file; Weddell Sea; Ross Sea; Greenland; Weddell; Greenland Sea; Labrador Sea; North Atlantic Deep Water; North Atlantic; Sea ice
• Online Access: https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.816370; https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.816370

The characteristics of a global set-up of the Finite-Element Sea-Ice Ocean Model under forcing of the period 1958-2004 are presented. The model set-up is designed to study the variability in the deep-water mass formation areas and was therefore regionally better resolved in the deep-water formation areas in the Labrador Sea, Greenland Sea, Weddell Sea and Ross Sea. The sea-ice model reproduces realistic sea-ice distributions and variabilities in the sea-ice extent of both hemispheres as well as sea-ice transport that compares well with observational data. Based on a comparison between model and ocean weather ship data in the North Atlantic, we observe that the vertical structure is well captured in areas with a high resolution. In our model set-up, we are able to simulate decadal ocean variability including several salinity anomaly events and corresponding fingerprint in the vertical hydrography. The ocean state of the model set-up features pronounced variability in the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation as well as the associated mixed layer depth pattern in the North Atlantic deep-water formation areas.