Eddies observed in the Ross Ice Shelf ocean cavity, and the implications for circulations and melting

Ice shelf ocean cavities are among the least observed regions of the oceans. While we know that eddying motions are ubiquitous in the oceans, there are few observations of such processes in ice shelf cavities. Here, we describe multi-year hydrographic mooring from central Ross Ice Shelf to understand baroclinic eddy properties and their potential effect on cavity circulation and basal ice melting. As the data are limited, some assumptions need to be made to estimate the eddying motion and separate it from the background circulation. Here we resolve the kinematic structures of the selected eddy signals. The analysis suggests the eddies are around 22 km in diameter with a velocity scale of between 0.8 and 1.8 cm/s. The thermohaline structure of the selected baroclinic eddies suggests that baroclinic eddies can entrain High Salinity Shelf Water from the benthic water column to the mid-water column. However, in the instance of the central Ross Ice Shelf cavity region, there are cold-water intrusions in the mid-water column that serve to partially isolate the ice from many of the ocean cavity conditions.