Atmospheric conditions associated with oceanic convection in the south-east Labrador Sea

It has been speculated that low-level reverse tip-jets, caused by the interaction of synoptic-scale atmospheric flow and Greenland, are an important mechanism for forcing open ocean convection in the south-east Labrador Sea. Here float data and meteorological reanalysis fields from the winter of 199...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Geophysical Research Letters
Main Authors: Sproson, David A. J., Renfrew, Ian A., Heywood, Karen J.
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: 2008
Subjects:
Greenland
Labrador Sea
North Atlantic
North Atlantic oscillation
Online Access:https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/24833/
https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/24833/1/sproson_etal_forcing_labsea_2007GL032971_GRL_2008.pdf
https://doi.org/10.1029/2007GL032971
Description
Summary:It has been speculated that low-level reverse tip-jets, caused by the interaction of synoptic-scale atmospheric flow and Greenland, are an important mechanism for forcing open ocean convection in the south-east Labrador Sea. Here float data and meteorological reanalysis fields from the winter of 1996/1997, in combination with a simple mixed-layer ocean model, are used to show that, although relatively deep ocean convection did occur during this winter, the primary forcing mechanism was cold-air outbreaks from the Labrador coast rather than the smaller scale reverse tip-jets. During this winter, the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) was in a weak positive phase. Similar treatments of the winters of 1994/1995 (strong, positive NAO) and 1995/1996 (strong, negative NAO) suggest that the result is robust regardless of the state of the NAO.

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