MACRO-DEFORMATIONS OF ICE COVER IN THE ARCTIC BASIN

S. M. Losev, Yu. A. Gorbunov, L. N. Dyment, and I. A. Sergeeva

Ice drift velocity divergence, ice cover deformation rate in the main directions, maximum shear deformation rate, and rotor are analyzed. All characteristics are calculated for the spring season based on the ice drift velocities derived at the 200 × 200 km grid points over five-day intervals from retrospective automatic buoy data. It was found that in the Arctic basin, deformation rates of stretching are generally greater than those of compression. Spatial differences of characteristics are considered. The most significant stretching deformation rates are recorded in the Beaufort Sea, while the compression deformation rates are observed in the area adjoining the northern coast of Greenland, where the North Pole-32 station terminated its operation in early March 2004 due to strong ice pressure and ridging. It is shown that the characteristics analyzed agree with the generalized parameters of ice cover discontinuities determined from satellite images.

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