ARCUS 17th Annual Meeting and Arctic Forum 2005

The Stress and Strain-Rate Kinematics of Sea Ice at 1, 15, and 200 km

Cathleen A Geiger¹, Jacqueline A. Richter-Menge², Bruce Elder³, Keran J Claffey^4
1Snow and Ice Branch, Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory, 72 Lyme Road, Hanover, NH, 03755, USA, Phone 603-646-4851, Fax 603-646-4644, cathleen.a.geiger@erdc.usace.army.mil
²Snow and Ice Branch, Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory, 72 Lyme Road, Hanover, NH, 03755, USA, Phone 603-646-4266, Fax 603-646-4644, jacqueline.a.richter-menge@erdc.usace.army.mil
³Snow and Ice Branch, Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory, 72 Lyme Road, Hanover, NH, 03755, USA
⁴Snow and Ice Branch, Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory, 72 Lyme Road, Hanover, NH, 03755, USA, keran.j.claffey@erdc.usace.army.mil

A synopsis of stress, drift, and strain-rate from three major field experiments in the Beaufort Sea within the last decade is available at website http://www.crrel.usace.army.mil/sid/SeaIceDynamics/index.htm. The Sea Ice Mechanics Initiative (SIMI – 1992/1993), the Surface Heat Budget of the Arctic Ocean (SHEBA – 1997/1998) and Beaufort 2001/2002 include three kinematic studies from the Beaufort Sea at scales of 1, 15, and 200 km, respectively. The data serve as a wonderful resource for improving and validating sea-ice and climate models, with instructive documentation for students, teachers, and researchers. The data archive includes raw and cleaned versions of thermal and dynamic stress; Lagrangian drift and strain-rate; and coincident winter SAR scenes as archived at the Alaska SAR Facility (ASF); and documentation detailing the experiments, instrument calibration, and data processing. Poster illustrated examples of stress and strain-rate kinematics are used to highlight interesting differences at the three scales.