Author(s): Mingrui Dai; Hayley H. Shen; Mark A. Hopkins; Stephen F. Ackley
Linked Author(s): Stephen Ackley
Keywords: No Keywords
Abstract: Vertical thin sections of cores taken from the ice cover in the Weddell Sea and the Okhotsk Sea show distinct layering structure. These observations suggest wave rafting may be important in defining the ice cover thickness in addition to the thermodynamic growth. Although wave rafting is intuitively apparent, a quantitative study of this phenomenon is absent. In this study we utilize both laboratory experiment and numerical simulations to determine the rafting thickness of a pancake ice field. We provide a theory that predicts the final rafted ice cover thickness. This thickness increases with the square of the wave amplitude and the floe diameter, but decreases with the cubic of the wavelength. We also conduct laboratory experiment with plastic model pancake ice, and numerical simulations using field scale wave conditions to study the rafting process. Both the laboratory and the computer simulation results compare favorably with the theory.
Year: 2004