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October 27, 2003
Seattle, Washington, USA

Variability in the Arctic Ocean: 1948-1993

Knut Aagaard¹, James H. Swift², Leonid Timokhov³, Yvgeny G. Nikiforov^4
1Applied Physics Laboratory, University of Washington, 1013 N.E. 40th St., Seattle, WA, 98105-6698, USA, Phone 206-543-8942, Fax 206-616-3142, aagaard@apl.washington.edu
²Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California San Diego, 9500 Gilman Drive - MC 0214, La Jolla, CA, 92093, USA, Phone 858-534-3387, Fax 858-534-7383, jswift@ucsd.edu
³Department of Oceanology, Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute, 38 Bering Street, St. Petersburg, 199397, Russia, Phone +7-812-352-3179, Fax +7-812-352-2883, aaricoop@aari.nw.ru
⁴Department of Oceanology, Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute, 38 Bering Street, St. Petersburg, 199397, Russia, Phone +7-812-352-3179, Fax +7-812-352-2883

We have developed a new statistical reduction of the Arctic Ocean data set that was released earlier under the Gore-Chernomyrdin environmental bilateral agreement, and which was in the form of decadal gridded fields. Our new reduction provides annual resolution of temperature and salinity in a set of thirteen boxes covering the Arctic Ocean during 1948-1993, as well as additional nutrient information.

In this study we examine interannual variability with respect to three issues: the salinity of the upper ocean, the temperature of the Atlantic layer, and, to a lesser degree, the extent of Pacific waters within the Arctic Ocean.

We find:

1. Evidence for a long-term and basin-wide transition to more saline conditions in the upper Arctic Ocean about 1976;
   
2. That the additional upper ocean salinity increase in the Eurasian Basin beginning about 1989 likely did not originate on the Kara and Laptev shelves;
   
3. That the Atlantic layer warmed significantly in the 1950s and 60s, and cooled in the 1970s;
   
4. That the phase propagation of these temperature anomalies is uncertain, contrary to that of the strong warming beginning in the late 1980s, which has been carried throughout much of the Arctic Ocean by the prevailing circulation;
   
5. That the Pacific waters, as indicated by the silicate maximum in the halocline, disappeared abruptly from the Makarov Basin in the mid-1980s.

Abstract Categories: Changes in the Sea

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