The Bering Strait oceanic heat transport influences seasonal sea ice retreat and advance in the Chukchi Sea. Monitored since 1990, it depends on water temperature and factors controlling the volume transport, assumed to be local winds in the strait and an oceanic pressure difference between the Pacific and Arctic oceans (the “pressure head”). Recent work suggests that variability in the pressure head, especially during summer, relates to the strength of the zonal wind in the East Siberian Sea that raises or drops sea surface height in this area via Ekman transport. We confirm that westward winds in the East Siberian Sea relate to a broader central Arctic pattern of high sea level pressure and note that anticyclonic winds over the central Arctic Ocean also favor low September sea ice extent for the Arctic as a whole by promoting ice convergence and positive temperature anomalies. Month‐to‐month persistence in the volume transport and atmospheric circulation patterns is low, but the period 1980–2017 had a significant summertime (June–August) trend toward higher sea level pressure over the central Arctic Ocean, favoring increased transports. Some recent large heat transports are associated with high water temperatures, consistent with persistence of open water in the Chukchi Sea into winter and early ice retreat in spring. The highest heat transport recorded, October 2016, resulted from high water temperatures and ideal wind conditions yielding a record‐high volume transport. November and December 2005, the only months with southward volume (and thus heat) transports, were associated with southward winds in the strait.
To track sea ice motion, four ice‐tethered buoys were deployed at 84.6°N and 144.3°W, 87.3°N and 172.3°W, 81.1°N and 157.4°W, and 82.8°N and 166.5°W in summers of 2008, 2010, 2014, and 2016, respectively. In addition, the remote sensed ice motion product provided by National Snow and Ice Data Center was used to reconstruct backward and forward ice drifting trajectories from the buoy deployment sites during 1979–2016. Sea ice in the central Arctic Ocean in late summer is trending to have travelled from lower latitudes, and to be advected to the region more involved in the Transpolar Drift Stream (TDS) during 1979–2016. The strengthened TDS has played a crucial role in Arctic sea ice loss from a dynamic perspective. The trajectory of ice is found to be significantly related to atmosphere circulation indices. The Central Arctic Index (CAI), defined as the difference in sea level pressure between 84°N, 90°W and 84°N, 90°E, can explain 34–40% of the meridional displacement along the backward trajectories, and it can explain 27–40% of the zonal displacement along the forward trajectories. The winter Beaufort High (BH) anomaly can explain 18–27% of the zonal displacement. Under high positive CAI values or high negative winter BH anomalies, floes from the central Arctic tended to be advected out of the Arctic Ocean through Fram Strait or other marginal gateways. Conversely, under high negative CAI values or high positive winter BH anomalies, ice tended to become trapped within a region close to the North Pole or it drifted into the Beaufort Gyre region. The long‐term trend and spatial change in Arctic surface air temperature were more remarkable during the freezing season than the melt season because most energy from the lower troposphere is used to melt sea ice and warm the upper ocean during summer.
more » « less- NSF-PAR ID:
- 10371528
- Publisher / Repository:
- Wiley Blackwell (John Wiley & Sons)
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- International Journal of Climatology
- Volume:
- 39
- Issue:
- 11
- ISSN:
- 0899-8418
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- p. 4372-4391
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
More Like this
-
more » « less
Abstract -
more » « less
Abstract Ocean‐to‐ice heat flux (OHF) is important in regulating the variability of sea ice mass balance. Using surface drifting buoy observations, we show that during winter in the Arctic Ocean's Beaufort Gyre region, OHF increased from 0.76 ± 0.05 W/m2over 2006–2012 to 1.63 ± 0.08 W/m2over 2013–2018. We find that this is a result of thinner and less‐compact sea ice that promotes enhanced winter ice growth, stronger ocean vertical convection, and subsurface heat entrainment. In contrast, Ekman upwelling declined over the study period, suggesting it had a secondary contribution to OHF changes. The enhanced ice growth creates a cooler, saltier, and deeper ocean surface mixed layer. In addition, the enhanced vertical temperature gradient near the mixed layer base in later years favors stronger entrainment of subsurface heat. OHF and its increase during 2006–2018 were not geographically uniform, with hot spots found in an upwelling region where ice was most seasonally variable.
-
null (Ed.)Abstract The Beaufort high (BH) and its accompanying anticyclonic winds drive the Arctic Ocean’s Beaufort Gyre, the major freshwater reservoir of the Arctic Ocean. The Beaufort Gyre circulation and its capacity to accumulate or release freshwater rely on the BH intensity. The migration of Nordic seas cyclones into the Arctic has been hypothesized to moderate the strength of the BH. We explore this hypothesis by analyzing reanalysis sea level pressure fields to characterize the BH and identify and track cyclones north of 60°N during 1948–2019. A cluster analysis of Nordic seas cyclone trajectories reveals a western pathway (through the Arctic interior) associated with a relatively weak BH and an eastern pathway (along the Arctic periphery) associated with a relatively strong BH. Furthermore, we construct cyclone activity indices (CAIs) in the Arctic and Nordic seas that take into account multiple cyclone parameters (number, strength, and duration). There are significant correlations between the BH and the CAIs in the Arctic and Nordic seas during 1948–2019, with anomalously strong cyclone activity related to an anomalously weak BH, and vice versa. We show how the Arctic and Nordic seas CAIs experienced a regime shift toward increased cyclone activity between the first four decades analyzed (1948–88) and the most recent three decades (1989–2019). Over the same two time periods, the BH exhibits a weakening. Increased cyclone activity and an accompanying weakening of the BH may be consistent with expectations in a warming Arctic and have implications for Beaufort Gyre dynamics and freshwater.more » « less
-
Using daily reanalysis data from 1979 to 2015, this paper examines the impact of winter Ural blocking (UB) on winter Arctic sea ice concentration (SIC) change over the Barents and Kara Seas (BKS). A case study of the sea ice variability in the BKS in the 2015/16 and 2016/17 winters is first presented to establish a link between the BKS sea ice variability and UB events. Then the UB events are classified into quasi-stationary (QUB), westward-shifting (WUB), and eastward-shifting (EUB) UB types. It is found that the frequency of the QUB events increases significantly during 1999–2015, whereas the WUB events show a decreasing fre- quency trend during 1979–2015. Moreover, it is shown that the variation of the BKS-SIC is related to downward infrared radiation (IR) and surface sensible and latent heat flux changes due to different zonal movements of the UB. Calculations show that the downward IR is the main driver of the BKS-SIC decline for QUB events, while the downward IR and surface sensible heat flux make comparable contributions to the BKS-SIC variation for WUB and EUB events. The SIC decline peak lags the QUB and EUB peaks by about 3 days, though QUB and EUB require lesser prior SIC. The QUB gives rise to the largest SIC decline likely because of its longer persistence, whereas the BKS-SIC decline is relatively weak for the EUB. The WUB is found to cause a SIC decline during its growth phase and an increase during its decay phase. Thus, the zonal movement of the UB has an important impact on the SIC variability in BKS.more » « less
-
Diminishing sea ice is impacting the wave field across the Arctic region. Recent observation and model-based studies highlight the spatiotemporal influence of sea ice on offshore wave climatologies, but effects within the nearshore region are still poorly described. This study characterizes the wave climate in the central Beaufort Sea coast from 1979 to 2019 by utilizing a wave hindcast model that uses ERA5 winds, waves, and ice concentrations as input. The spectral wave model SWAN is calibrated and validated based on more than 10,000 in situ measurements collected over a 13-year time period across the region, with friction variations and empirical coefficients for newly implemented empirical ice formulations for the open water season. Model results and trends are analyzed over the 41-year time period using the non-parametric Mann-Kendall test, including an estimate of Sen’s slope. The model results show that the reduction of sea ice concentration correlates strongly with increases in average and extreme wave conditions. In particular, the open water season extended by ~96 days over the 41-year time period (~2.4 days/yr), resulting in a five-fold increase of the yearly cumulative wave power. Moreover, the open water season extends later into the year, resulting in relatively open-water conditions during fall storms with high wind speeds. The later freeze-up results in an increase of the annual offshore median wave heights of 1% per year and an increase in the average number of rough wave days (defined as days when maximum wave heights exceed 2.5 m) from 1.5 in 1979 to 13.1 days in 2019. Trends in the nearshore areas deviate from the patterns offshore. Model results indicate a non-breaking depth induced saturation limit for high wave heights in the shallow areas of Foggy Island Bay. Similar patterns are found for yearly cumulative wave power.more » « less
