Pacific Ocean inflow: Influence on catastrophic reduction of sea ice cover in the Arctic Ocean

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Editor's Highlight Read Full Article (file size: 2603568 bytes) Cited by GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS, VOL. 33, L08605, doi:10.1029/2005GL025624, 2006 Pacific Ocean inflow: Influence on catastrophic reduction of sea ice cover in the Arctic Ocean Koji Shimada Institute of Observational Research for Global Change, Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology, Yokosuka, Japan Takashi Kamoshida Institute of Observational Research for Global Change, Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology, Yokosuka, Japan Motoyo Itoh Institute of Observational Research for Global Change, Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology, Yokosuka, Japan Shigeto Nishino Institute of Observational Research for Global Change, Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology, Yokosuka, Japan Eddy Carmack Fisheries and Oceans Canada, Institute of Ocean Sciences, Sidney, British Columbia, Canada Fiona McLaughlin Fisheries and Oceans Canada, Institute of Ocean Sciences, Sidney, British Columbia, Canada Sarah Zimmermann Fisheries and Oceans Canada, Institute of Ocean Sciences, Sidney, British Columbia, Canada Andrey Proshutinsky Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Woods Hole, Massachusetts, USA Abstract The spatial pattern of recent ice reduction in the Arctic Ocean is similar to the distribution of warm Pacific Summer Water (PSW) that interflows the upper portion of halocline in the southern Canada Basin. Increases in PSW temperature in the basin are also well-correlated with the onset of sea-ice reduction that began in the late 1990s. However, increases in PSW temperature in the basin do not correlate with the temperature of upstream source water in the northeastern Bering Sea, suggesting that there is another mechanism which controls these concurrent changes in ice cover and upper ocean temperature. We propose a feedback mechanism whereby the delayed sea-ice formation in early winter, which began in 1997/1998, reduced internal ice stresses and thus allowed a more efficient coupling of anticyclonic wind forcing to the upper ocean. This, in turn, increased the flux of warm PSW into the basin and caused the catastrophic changes. Received 27 December 2005; accepted 13 March 2006; published 21 April 2006. Index Terms: 4207 Oceanography: General: Arctic and Antarctic oceanography (9310, 9315); 4532 Oceanography: Physical: General circulation (1218, 1222); 4540 Oceanography: Physical: Ice mechanics and air/sea/ice exchange processes (0700, 0750, 0752, 0754). Read Full Article (file size: 2603568 bytes) Cited by Citation: Shimada, K., T. Kamoshida, M. Itoh, S. Nishino, E. Carmack, F. McLaughlin, S. Zimmermann, and A. Proshutinsky (2006), Pacific Ocean inflow: Influence on catastrophic reduction of sea ice cover in the Arctic Ocean, Geophys. Res. Lett., 33, L08605, doi:10.1029/2005GL025624. Copyright 2006 by the American Geophysical Union.

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