Impacts of a lengthening open water season on Alaskan coastal communities: deriving locally relevant indices from large-scale datasets and community observations

Rolph, Rebecca J.; Mahoney, Andrew R.; Walsh, John; Loring, Philip A.

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-12-1779-2018

Articles | Volume 12, issue 5

https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-12-1779-2018

© Author(s) 2018. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-12-1779-2018

© Author(s) 2018. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 12, issue 5

Research article

|

28 May 2018

Research article |

| 28 May 2018

Impacts of a lengthening open water season on Alaskan coastal communities: deriving locally relevant indices from large-scale datasets and community observations

Rebecca J. Rolph, Andrew R. Mahoney, John Walsh, and Philip A. Loring

Download

Final revised paper (published on 28 May 2018)
Supplement to the final revised paper
Preprint (discussion started on 09 Oct 2017)

Interactive discussion

Status: closed

AC: Author comment | RC: Referee comment | SC: Short comment | EC: Editor comment

- Printer-friendly version

- Supplement

RC1: 'detailed review', Anonymous Referee #1, 31 Oct 2017
- AC1: 'Authors response to Reviewer 1', Rebecca Rolph, 20 Dec 2017
SC1: 'Review from UZH Earth System Science students', Ilja van Meerveld, 30 Nov 2017
- AC4: 'Authors response to short comment', Rebecca Rolph, 21 Dec 2017
RC2: 'Response to review criteria', Gita Ljubicic, 30 Nov 2017
- AC2: 'Authors response to Reviewer 2', Rebecca Rolph, 20 Dec 2017
RC3: 'Reviewer Comments', Anonymous Referee #3, 01 Dec 2017
- AC3: 'Authors response to Reviewer 3', Rebecca Rolph, 20 Dec 2017

Peer-review completion

AR: Author's response | RR: Referee report | ED: Editor decision

AR by Rebecca Rolph on behalf of the Authors (16 Jan 2018) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Referee Nomination & Report Request started (06 Feb 2018) by Julienne Stroeve

RR by Anonymous Referee #3 (20 Feb 2018)

Suggestions for revision or reasons for rejection

The authors thoroughly responded to the first round of reviewer comments. The paper is now much more focused and better utilizes the data presented to draw conclusions. I have attached a pdf with many comments embedded. Most comments are minor. Below, I list the areas that I believe require a bit more attention before the paper is published.

1. The title references "community knowledge" and the first sentence of the abstract states that this study is "Using thresholds of physical climate variables developed directly from indigenous knowledge". I find these claims of using community and indigenous knowledge too generous in describing the approach of this study. There are references to wind thresholds that are dangerous, references to how hunting is impacted by barge noise and ice conditions, etc., but I think it is problematic to claim that this paper used "indigenous knowledge" in the study. This is not a critique of the study itself, but rather in how it is described. This is certainly a paper that is applicable to these communities and uses community "observations" in their methodoloy and discussion, but use of knowledge is a much different thing, especially as we are seeing the raising of the bar for what is classified as indigenous knowledge research and knowledge co-production.

2. Figure 1 shows the grid cells used to extract the sea ice concentration and weather data, which provides much of the basis for this paper's analysis. The large flaw lead system that develops off of Alaska's North Slope in winter and spring typically occurs south of the grid cells chosen to represent conditions off Utqiagvik. Therefore, I am concerned that the location for the ice analysis doesn't represent conditions near the village, especially in spring. This should be discussed in the paper, and the selection for grid cells better justified.

3. The paper analyzes severe winds events capable of geomorphological change. In this regard, wind direction is of high importance, yet the authors only look at scalar values. For example, onshore and downwelling winds will have more potential for coastal sediment erosion and storm surge. At Utqiagvik, it is stormy winds from the West and NW that are most likely to cause coastal change or damage. Why have the authors not looked at specific wind components to characterize sever wind events?

Lastly, I believe this paper will eventually make a nice contribution to the literature. Of greatest potential value (in my opinion) is the opportunity to illuminate the different ice regimes and conditions across these three communities. The differences are mentioned, but could be discussed a bit more in the conclusions, especially in the sense of what may be expected with further change. The paper makes a lot of general, broad comments on community impacts. It could be improved with a few more comments specific to these three communities.

Referee Report: PDF

Hide

RR by Anonymous Referee #1 (12 Mar 2018)

ED: Reconsider after major revisions (15 Mar 2018) by Julienne Stroeve

AR by Rebecca Rolph on behalf of the Authors (22 Apr 2018) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Publish as is (03 May 2018) by Julienne Stroeve

AR by Rebecca Rolph on behalf of the Authors (03 May 2018) Author's response Manuscript

Short summary

Using thresholds of physical climate variables developed from community observations, together with two large-scale datasets, we have produced local indices directly relevant to the impacts of a reduced sea ice cover on Alaska coastal communities. We demonstrate how community observations can inform use of large-scale datasets to derive these locally relevant indices.