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Measured volume, heat, and salt fluxes from the Atlantic to the Arctic Mediterranean
Bjerknes Centre for Climate Research and Geophysical Institute, University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway
Marine Laboratory, Oceanographic Research and Services, Fisheries Research Services, Aberdeen, UK
Marine Research Institute and University of Akureyri, Akureyri, Iceland
Fisheries Laboratory of the Faroes, Torshavn, Faroe Islands
The flow of warm and saline Atlantic water towards the Arctic crosses the Greenland-Scotland Ridge in three current branches. Since the mid 1990's, extensive monitoring with quasi-permanent moorings and regular CTD cruises has been in operation on three sections crossing the branches. Averaged over the years 1999 to 2001, values of volume, heat (relative to 0°C) and salt flux due to the total Atlantic inflow across the Greenland-Scotland Ridge into the Nordic Seas are estimated as 8.5 Sv (1 Sv = 106 m3·s−1), 313·1012 W, and 303·106 kg·s−1. In this period, the average temperature and salinity of the Atlantic inflow were 8.5°C and 35.25, respectively. Within the observational uncertainty, we do not find any significant seasonal variation of the volume flux, but a negative correlation between the inflow flux through the Faroe-Shetland Channel and through the other two gaps was indicated.
Received 5 December 2004; accepted 14 March 2005; published 7 April 2005.
Citation: (2005), Measured volume, heat, and salt fluxes from the Atlantic to the Arctic Mediterranean, Geophys. Res. Lett., 32, L07603, doi:10.1029/2004GL022188.
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