The IAOOS arctic network project, status and prospect

Abstract:

It is quite clear that for studying Arctic climate changes, and better understand interacting processes it is essential to follow an integrated approach for observing and modeling the whole Arctic system encompassing the atmosphere, the ocean and sea-ice at once. Due to the difficulties in retrieving key parameters, satellite observations alone are not the right answer. The project we are developing, is an attempt to tackle this challenge by providing and maintaining a new integrated observing network of instrumented buoys over the Arctic Ocean in order to collect simultaneously and in real time information related to the state of the upper Ocean, the lower Atmosphere and the Arctic sea-ice/snow.

It is planned to operate several autonomous platforms in a network in the Arctic Ocean for a period of at least 5 years. Each platform is equipped to vertically sense and profile key variables in the ocean, sea-ice and atmosphere using

- CTD (conductivity, temperature, depth) vertical profilers sensors collecting ocean temperature and salinity down to 800m depth,

- Temperature and heat conductivity in snow and ice from ice-mass-balance systems

- Cloud and aerosol lidar profiling of the lower atmosphere

- Diffuse and direct solar flux using wide angle radiometer

- Meteorological standard parameters at the surface

Platforms allow measurements to be transmitted in near real time via Iridium satellites. As they will be drifting, it is planned to replace part of them every year.

Major tests were performed deploying progressively fully equipped IAOOS platform at the North Pole in April 2012, 2013 and 2014. These platforms drifted from the North Pole in April to Fram Strait (September, October) providing spring summer and fall field data. Important fieldwork for IAOOS was also taking place within the Norwegian ice camp on board R/V Lance organized by the Norsk Polar Institute from January to June 2015, as part of the Norwegian young ICE (N-ICE 2015) cruise project. These intensive tests were very timely. The first IAOOS array deployment will start in August 2015 from R/V Araon during the Korean cruise organized by the KOPRI in the Canadian Basin and from R/V Polarstern during the German cruise TRANSARC II organized by the Alfred Wegener Institute in the Eurasian Basin. First results obtained in the frame of IAOOS will be presented and discussed.