The history of a cluster of large icebergs on leaving the Weddell Sea pack ice and their impact on the ocean
The life history and oceanic impact of three very large icebergs that escaped together from the Weddell Sea sea ice, near the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula, are traced from March 2014. Despite the initial proximity of these three icebergs, they followed very different trajectories across the South...
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ftsouthampton:oai:eprints.soton.ac.uk:477420 2023-12-03T10:13:55+01:00 The history of a cluster of large icebergs on leaving the Weddell Sea pack ice and their impact on the ocean Bigg, Grant R. Marsh, Robert 2023-04-24 text https://eprints.soton.ac.uk/477420/ https://eprints.soton.ac.uk/477420/1/the_history_of_a_cluster_of_large_icebergs_on_leaving_the_weddell_sea_pack_ice_and_their_impact_on_the_ocean.pdf en English eng https://eprints.soton.ac.uk/477420/1/the_history_of_a_cluster_of_large_icebergs_on_leaving_the_weddell_sea_pack_ice_and_their_impact_on_the_ocean.pdf Bigg, Grant R. and Marsh, Robert (2023) The history of a cluster of large icebergs on leaving the Weddell Sea pack ice and their impact on the ocean. Antarctic Science, 35 (3), 1-18. (doi:10.1017/S0954102022000517 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0954102022000517>). cc_by_nc_nd_4 Article PeerReviewed 2023 ftsouthampton https://doi.org/10.1017/S0954102022000517 2023-11-03T00:08:25Z The life history and oceanic impact of three very large icebergs that escaped together from the Weddell Sea sea ice, near the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula, are traced from March 2014. Despite the initial proximity of these three icebergs, they followed very different trajectories across the South Atlantic until their eventual break-up and melting 1 year later. The largest, giant iceberg, B17a, spent extensive periods grounded near two different islands. The triplet's gradual melting is examined through the impact on the icebergs' dimensions, but also the meltwater's oceanic influence on the local salinity and primary productivity. It is found that there was generally a significant local surface and mixed-layer freshening of a few tenths of a practical salinity unit, up to several hundred kilometres away from the 10–20 km-sized icebergs. In contrast, the chlorophyll impact was highly temporally variable, although it tended to be larger in the summer. Break-up of these large icebergs did not occur until near the end of their life. We also show that modelling the trajectories of individual very large icebergs can be reasonable for up to 2 weeks if the characteristics of the iceberg and the local ocean and atmospheric forcing are well known. Article in Journal/Newspaper Antarc* Antarctic Antarctic Peninsula Antarctic Science Iceberg* Sea ice Weddell Sea University of Southampton: e-Prints Soton Antarctic The Antarctic Antarctic Peninsula Weddell Sea Weddell Antarctic Science 1 18 |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
University of Southampton: e-Prints Soton |
op_collection_id |
ftsouthampton |
language |
English |
description |
The life history and oceanic impact of three very large icebergs that escaped together from the Weddell Sea sea ice, near the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula, are traced from March 2014. Despite the initial proximity of these three icebergs, they followed very different trajectories across the South Atlantic until their eventual break-up and melting 1 year later. The largest, giant iceberg, B17a, spent extensive periods grounded near two different islands. The triplet's gradual melting is examined through the impact on the icebergs' dimensions, but also the meltwater's oceanic influence on the local salinity and primary productivity. It is found that there was generally a significant local surface and mixed-layer freshening of a few tenths of a practical salinity unit, up to several hundred kilometres away from the 10–20 km-sized icebergs. In contrast, the chlorophyll impact was highly temporally variable, although it tended to be larger in the summer. Break-up of these large icebergs did not occur until near the end of their life. We also show that modelling the trajectories of individual very large icebergs can be reasonable for up to 2 weeks if the characteristics of the iceberg and the local ocean and atmospheric forcing are well known. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Bigg, Grant R. Marsh, Robert |
spellingShingle |
Bigg, Grant R. Marsh, Robert The history of a cluster of large icebergs on leaving the Weddell Sea pack ice and their impact on the ocean |
author_facet |
Bigg, Grant R. Marsh, Robert |
author_sort |
Bigg, Grant R. |
title |
The history of a cluster of large icebergs on leaving the Weddell Sea pack ice and their impact on the ocean |
title_short |
The history of a cluster of large icebergs on leaving the Weddell Sea pack ice and their impact on the ocean |
title_full |
The history of a cluster of large icebergs on leaving the Weddell Sea pack ice and their impact on the ocean |
title_fullStr |
The history of a cluster of large icebergs on leaving the Weddell Sea pack ice and their impact on the ocean |
title_full_unstemmed |
The history of a cluster of large icebergs on leaving the Weddell Sea pack ice and their impact on the ocean |
title_sort |
history of a cluster of large icebergs on leaving the weddell sea pack ice and their impact on the ocean |
publishDate |
2023 |
url |
https://eprints.soton.ac.uk/477420/ https://eprints.soton.ac.uk/477420/1/the_history_of_a_cluster_of_large_icebergs_on_leaving_the_weddell_sea_pack_ice_and_their_impact_on_the_ocean.pdf |
geographic |
Antarctic The Antarctic Antarctic Peninsula Weddell Sea Weddell |
geographic_facet |
Antarctic The Antarctic Antarctic Peninsula Weddell Sea Weddell |
genre |
Antarc* Antarctic Antarctic Peninsula Antarctic Science Iceberg* Sea ice Weddell Sea |
genre_facet |
Antarc* Antarctic Antarctic Peninsula Antarctic Science Iceberg* Sea ice Weddell Sea |
op_relation |
https://eprints.soton.ac.uk/477420/1/the_history_of_a_cluster_of_large_icebergs_on_leaving_the_weddell_sea_pack_ice_and_their_impact_on_the_ocean.pdf Bigg, Grant R. and Marsh, Robert (2023) The history of a cluster of large icebergs on leaving the Weddell Sea pack ice and their impact on the ocean. Antarctic Science, 35 (3), 1-18. (doi:10.1017/S0954102022000517 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0954102022000517>). |
op_rights |
cc_by_nc_nd_4 |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1017/S0954102022000517 |
container_title |
Antarctic Science |
container_start_page |
1 |
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18 |
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1784260923302608896 |