Meteoric water and glacial melt in the southeastern Amundsen Sea: a time series from 1994 to 2020

Hennig, Andrew N.; Mucciarone, David A.; Jacobs, Stanley S.; Mortlock, Richard A.; Dunbar, Robert B.

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-18-791-2024

Articles | Volume 18, issue 2

https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-18-791-2024

© Author(s) 2024. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-18-791-2024

© Author(s) 2024. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 18, issue 2

Research article

|

20 Feb 2024

Research article |

| 20 Feb 2024

Meteoric water and glacial melt in the southeastern Amundsen Sea: a time series from 1994 to 2020

Andrew N. Hennig, David A. Mucciarone, Stanley S. Jacobs, Richard A. Mortlock, and Robert B. Dunbar

Data sets

Antarctic Seawater d18O isotope data and calculated glacial melt (meteoric), sea ice melt, and circumpolar deep water (CDW) water mass fractions from SE Amundsen Sea: 1994, 200, 2007, 2009, 2014, 2019, 2020 Andrew N. Hennig et al. https://doi.org/10.25740/zf704jg7109

Short summary

A total of 937 seawater paired oxygen isotope (δ¹⁸O)–salinity samples collected during seven cruises on the SE Amundsen Sea between 1994 and 2020 reveal a deep freshwater source with δ¹⁸O − 29.4±1.0‰, consistent with the signature of local ice shelf melt. Local mean meteoric water content – comprised primarily of glacial meltwater – increased between 1994 and 2020 but exhibited greater interannual variability than increasing trend.