Abstract:
Metadata record for data from ASAC Project 2085
See the link below for public details on this project.
---- Public Summary from Project ----
Over the past 20 years, Australian glaciologists have measured the ice thickness, snow accumulation rate and ice surface movement rate around the Antarctic continent, approximately following the 2,000 m elevation contour. They have completed this survey for
... the entire Australian Antarctic sector, except for one section between Davis and the Russian station, Mirny. This project will carry out the measurements in this last section.
It will also carry out detailed measurements of ice thickness and ice movement rate on the Lambert Glacier and some of its tributaries. This glacier is the largest in the world and it drains about one eighth of the Antarctic ice mass into the sea.
From these measurements, calculations of the mass flux (i.e. the amount of ice flowing through the section) are made. Changes over time in the mass flux indicate whether the ice sheet is getting larger or smaller, and this in turn is related to climate and sea level change.
This project aims to determine the ice thickness, surface ice velocity and mass discharge of the region between Mirny and the Larsemann Hills. This is the remaining gap in the otherwise comprehensive ANARE measurements of mass discharge across the 2000 m elevation contour between 40E and 130E. Observations were conducted over three summer field seasons from Jan. 1998 to Jan. 2000, with the use two Sikorsky S76 long range helicopters based at Davis. Ice thickness was obtained with the ANARE 100 MHz ice radar mounted in one of the helicopters. The transmitter and receiver configurations are essentially the same as that used on the Lambert Glacier tractor traverse (see Higham et al.,1995). To accommodate speeds of up to 180 km/hr in airborne operations the slower digital oscilloscope system has been replaced by a high speed digital signal processor and a high speed analogue to digital converter. The airborne antenna used by the helicopter is smaller than that used by tractor traverses and the signal processing power of the DSP has been improved to compensate for reduced antenna gain. Ice velocity and surface elevation were measured at selected locations with dual frequency GPS instruments. Accumulation and gravity observations were also made at these sites. An automatic weather station (AWS) was installed at one of the survey sites 50 km south of Mt Brown. In addition to filling a major gap in the synoptic network, the AWS will be used to assist in the interpretation of a shallow snow core. 
