New 2 year long records from three moorings, located at
76°S along the eastern flank and shelf of the Filchner Trough, give insight in the seasonal cycle of hydrography to a region where Modified Warm Deep Water (MWDW) enters the southern Weddell Sea continental shelf, possibly reaching the Filchner Ronne Ice Shelf, the biggest ice shelf (by volume) in Antarctica. A persistent northward flow of Ice Shelf Water (ISW) is found along the eastern flank of the trough at 400 m depth, while the data on the eastern shelf indicate a seasonal cycle, characterized by four phases. A distinct warm inflow period (separated in two phases), with maximum temperatures of
−1°C, appears to be related to the seasonal heaving of the Antarctic Slope Front thermocline along the continental shelf break further north and a seasonal extension of the ISW layer onto the eastern shelf. The density gradients between the ISW in the trough and the MWDW on the adjacent shelf drive the southward flow during these phases. A flow reversal is found in winter, ceasing the southward flow along the eastern flank of the trough. Weaker density gradients between the trough and the shelf during winter allow a westward flow, partly driven by a N‐S density gradient, existing across the eastern shelf during this time. From spring through to summer, the ISW layer in the trough extends onto the eastern shelf where it occupies the bottom layer at our moorings, associated with northward flow.
a b s t r a c tThe Weddell Sea plays an important role for the global oceans and climate by being one of the biggest production and export areas of Antarctic Bottom Water (AABW). Circumpolar Deep Water (CDW) enters the Weddell Gyre (WG) at its eastern boundary. Then called Warm Deep Water (WDW), it is a major contributor to the formation of deep and bottom waters due to ocean-ice shelf interactions in the southern and soutwestern Weddell Sea. Hydrographic data collected between 0 and 30°E on the RV Polarstern cruise ANT XX/2 reveals a two-core structure for the eastern inflow of warm water at roughly 20°E but not further downstream at the Greenwich meridian (GM). Model results and climatological fields suggest that the two cores represent two separate modes of warm inflow. One mode is driven by eddy mixing in the northeastern corner of the WG and the other one is an advective mode, forming the southern branch of the inflow which extends beyond 30°E before turning westward. Both pathways are likely to carry waters from different origins within the Antarctic Circumpolar Current ACC, where more ventilated CDW is found at the Southern Boundary SB compared to the centre. The southern route shows considerable interannual variability in the model. A variable inflow of two types of CDW together with admixed recirculated and cooler waters from the Weddell Sea can potentially contribute to the observed variability and warming trend of WDW over the last decade at the GM.
The Northwest Atlantic, which has exhibited evidence of accelerated warming compared to the global ocean, also experienced several notable marine heatwaves (MHWs) over the last decade. We analyze spatiotemporal patterns of surface and subsurface temperature structure across the Northwest Atlantic continental shelf and slope to assess the influences of atmospheric and oceanic processes on ocean temperatures. Here we focus on MHWs from 2015/16 and examine their physical drivers using observational and reanalysis products. We find that a combination of jet stream latitudinal position and ocean advection, mainly due to warm core rings shed by the Gulf Stream, plays a role in MHW development. While both atmospheric and oceanic drivers can lead to MHWs they have different temperature signatures with each affecting the vertical structure differently and horizontal spatial patterns of a MHW. Northwest Atlantic MHWs have significant socio-economic impacts and affect commercially important species such as squid and lobster.
The Antarctic continent stores the largest amount of freshwater on Earth. However, the Antarctic ice sheets and glaciers are losing mass, leading to a cumulative sea level rise of 14 mm since 1979 (Rignot et al., 2019). Some ice mass loss could be linked to changes in the atmosphere, such as the warming of the Antarctic Peninsula (Vaughan et al., 2003), which triggered the decay of the Larsen ice shelves (Broeke, 2005;Rott et al., 1996). However, the majority of ice mass was lost from glaciers and ice sheets that were exposed to the influence of warm ocean waters (Rignot et al., 2019). Thompson et al. (2018) classify the Antarctic
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