Abstracts
SEARCH Open Science Meeting
October 27, 2003
Seattle, Washington, USA
Inter-Annual Variability in Arctic Sea Ice Thickness from Space
Seymour Laxon1
1Centre For Polar Observation and Modelling, University College London, Pearson Building, Gower St, London, WC1E 6BT, UK, Phone 44-207-679-3932, Fax 44-207-679-7883, swl@cpom.ucl.ac.uk
Knowledge of the inter-annual variability in sea ice thickness is key to understanding both recent and future changes in Arctic sea ice. The significance of trends in Arctic sea ice drafts over the last few decades, using data gathered by intermittent submarine cruises, can only be determined though knowledge of the natural variability in ice thickness. Predictions of future changes in ice thickness also reply on properly representing the variability in ice thickness and the factors which control it. However in-situ data on ice thickness is insufficient to verify model simulations.
Here we present an time-series of sea ice thickness derived from satellite radar altimetry. We find that ice thickness is highly variable on inter-annual timescales and is controlled almost entirely by changes in the length of the summer melt season1. We also find that ice thickness during the past two winters has recovered to levels seen in 1993.
1. Laxon S., Peacock N. & Smith D., High interannual variability of sea ice thickness in the Arctic Region, Nature, doi10.1038/nature02050 (2003).
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