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[1] We report on a combined modeling and observational effort to understand the Denmark Strait Overflow (DSO). Four cruises over the course of 3 years mapped hydrographic properties and velocity fields with high spatial resolution. The observations reveal the mean path of the dense water, as well as the presence of strong barotropic flows, energetic variability, and strong bottom friction and entrainment. A regional sigma coordinate numerical model of interbasin exchange using realistic bottom topography and an overflow forced only by an upstream reservoir of dense fluid is compared with the observations and used to further investigate these processes. The model successfully reproduces the volume transport of dense water at the sill, as well as the 1000-m descent of the dense water in the first 200 km from the sill and the intense eddies generated at 1-3 day intervals. Hydraulic control of the mean flow is indicated by a region supercritical to long gravity waves in the dense layer located approximately 100 km downstream of the sill in both model and observations. In addition, despite the differences in surface forcing, both model and observations exhibit similar transitions from mostly barotropic flow at the sill to a bottom-trapped baroclinic flow downstream, indicating the dominant role of the overflow in determining the full water column dynamics.

The warming Nordic seas potentially tend to decrease the overflow across the Greenland–Iceland–Scotland Ridge (GISR) system. Recent observations by Macrander et al. document a significant drop in the intensity of outflowing Denmark Strait Overflow Water of more than 20% over 3 yr and a simultaneous increase in the temperature of the bottom layers of more than 0.4°C. A simulation of the exchange across the GISR with a regional ocean circulation model is used here to identify possible mechanisms that control changes in the Denmark Strait overflow and its relations to changed forcing condition. On seasonal and longer time scales, the authors establish links of the overflow anomalies to a decreasing capacity of the dense water reservoir caused by a change of circulation pattern north of the sill. On annual and shorter time scales, the wind stress curl around Iceland determines the barotropic circulation around the island and thus the barotropic flow through Denmark Strait. For the overlapping time scales, the barotropic and overflow component interactively determine transport variations. Last, a relation between sea surface height and reservoir height changes upstream of the sill is used to predict the overflow variability from altimeter data. Estimated changes are in agreement with other recent transport estimates based on current-meter arrays.

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Abstract. We report on a rapid high-resolution survey of the Denmark Strait overflow (DSO) as it crosses the sill, the first such program to incorporate full-water-column velocity profiles in addition to conventional hydrographic measurements. Seven transects with expendable profilers over the course of one week are used to estimate volume transport as a function of density. Our observations reveal the presence of a strongly barotropic flow associated with the nearly-vertical front dividing the Arctic and Atlantic waters. The sevensection mean transport of water denser than er0 = 27.8 is 2.7 + 0.6 Sv, while the mean transport of water colder than 2.0øC is 3.8 + 0.8 Sv. Although this is larger than the 2.9 Sv of 0 • 2øC water measured by a 1973 current meter array, we find that a sampling of our sections equivalent to the extent of that array also measures 2.9Sv of cold water. Both the structure and magnitude of the measured flow are reproduced well by a high-resolution numerical model of buoyancy-driven exchange with realistic topography.