OS43E:
Unprecedented Bering Sea Ice Extent and Impacts to Marine Ecosystems and Western Alaskan Communities Posters


Submit an Abstract to this Session


Session ID#: 50886

Session Description:
Anomalously warm sea surface temperatures during summer of 2017 led to record late winter freeze-up and low ice extent in the Northern Bering Sea and Strait region. Arctic Amplification of climate change is driving unprecedented, sweeping changes to the Alaskan landscape and surrounding seas. Diminished sea ice coverage has serious implications for coastal communities, indigenous subsistence hunting and currently poses a threat to food security and navigation safety. An interdisciplinary approach to monitoring marine ecosystem impacts combined with physical oceanography and sea ice dynamics and consequent impacts to human systems is central to creating a system level understanding both at present and into the future. We invite presentations on emerging phenomena such as increasingly prevalent harmful algal blooms, changes in marine food web processes and populations, altered circulation and stratification dynamics and impacts of winter storms on communities. Preliminary results from recent field work and long-term model projections are welcomed.
Primary Convener:  Emily Osborne, NOAA Ocean Acidification Program, Oceanic and Atmospheric Research, Silver Spring, United States
Conveners:  Molly McCammon, Alaska Ocean Observing System, Anchorage, AK, United States and Olivia Astillero Lee, University of Alaska Fairbanks, Fairbanks, AK, United States
Primary Liaison:  Emily Osborne, NOAA Ocean Acidification Program, Oceanic and Atmospheric Research, Silver Spring, United States
Chairs:  Emily Osborne, University of South Carolina, Columbia, United States and Molly McCammon, Alaska Ocean Observing System, Anchorage, AK, United States
OSPA Liaison:  Emily Osborne, University of South Carolina, Columbia, United States
Co-Organized with:
Ocean Sciences, GeoHealth, and Cryosphere

Cross-Listed:
  • C - Cryosphere
  • GH - GeoHealth

Proposed Co-Organized Session with:
  • C - Cryosphere
  • GH - GeoHealth
Index Terms:

0232 Impacts of climate change: ecosystem health [GEOHEALTH]
0738 Ice [CRYOSPHERE]
4215 Climate and interannual variability [OCEANOGRAPHY: GENERAL]
4817 Food webs, structure, and dynamics [OCEANOGRAPHY: BIOLOGICAL AND CHEMICAL]

Abstracts Submitted to this Session:

It's all different now. Implications of the unprecedented Bering Sea conditions and where we go from here. (422000)
Amy Holman, NOAA Alaska Regional Collaboration Team, Anchorage, MD, United States, Molly McCammon, Alaska Ocean Observing System, Anchorage, AK, United States, Emily Osborne, NOAA Ocean Acidification Program, Oceanic and Atmospheric Research, Silver Spring, United States, Gay Sheffield, Alaska Sea Grant, Nome, AK, United States and Richard Thoman, National Weather Service Alaska Region, Environmental and Scientific Services Division, Fairbanks, AK, United States
Causes of Sea ice Extremes in the Pacific Arctic During Winter and Spring  2018 (395999)
Muyin Wang, University of Washington Seattle Campus, Seattle, United States, James E Overland, NOAA Seattle, Seattle, United States and Phyllis J Stabeno, NOAA Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory, Seattle, WA, United States
The Seasonal Cycle on the Southeast Bering Sea shelf: Three Years of Observations from an Innovative Prawler (Profiling Crawler) Mooring (414768)
Carol A Ladd1, Shaun W Bell2, Calvin W. Mordy3 and Phyllis J Stabeno2, (1)NOAA Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory, Seattle, WA, United States, (2)NOAA Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory, Seattle, United States, (3)University of Washington, CICOES, Seattle, United States
Analysis of Meltpond Distribution on Sea Ice across a Distributed Biological Observatory in the Pacific Arctic Region using MODIS Satellite Imagery, 2000–2018 (466603)
Luisa Young and Karen E Frey, Clark University, Graduate School of Geography, Worcester, MA, United States
The Changing Oxygen Isotope Composition of the Bering Sea Contribution to the Arctic Ocean Upper Halocline Provides an Independent Opportunity for Constraining an Increasing Freshwater Flux Through Bering Strait (453531)
Lee W Cooper1, Cedric Magen2 and Jacqueline M. Grebmeier1, (1)University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, Chesapeake Biological Laboratory, Solomons, United States, (2)University of Maryland College Park, Department of Geology, College Park, United States
Light transmittance through the ocean water column following record low sea ice extents across a Distributed Biological Observatory in the Pacific Arctic Region (465555)
Karen E Frey1, Melishia I Santiago1, Luisa N. C. Young2, Jacqueline M. Grebmeier3 and Lee W Cooper3, (1)Clark University, Graduate School of Geography, Worcester, MA, United States, (2)Clark University, Graduate School of Geography, Worcester, United States, (3)University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, Chesapeake Biological Laboratory, Solomons, United States
Biomarkers used to determine past and present impacts of declining sea ice on Pacific Arctic food webs (391873)
Chelsea Wegner1, Lee W Cooper2, Jacqueline M. Grebmeier2 and Thomas A Brown3, (1)University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, Chesapeake Biological Laboratory, Solomons, MD, United States, (2)University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, Chesapeake Biological Laboratory, Solomons, United States, (3)Scottish Association for Marine Science, Oban, United Kingdom
Changes in Population Dynamics of a Key Food Web Component, the Bivalve Macoma calcarea in the Northern Bering Sea from 1998-2015 and its Relation to Rapidly Changing Environmental Parameters (440089)
Christina L Goethel1, Jacqueline M. Grebmeier1 and Lee W. Cooper2, (1)University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, Chesapeake Biological Laboratory, Solomons, United States, (2)University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, Chesapeake Biological Laboratory, Solomons, MD, United States
Survival and Breeding Response of a Sea-ice Obligate Seabird Following the Unprecedented Low Extent of Winter Ice in the Bering Sea (423771)
George Divoky, Cooper Island Arctic Research, Seattle, WA, United States, David C Douglas, USGS Alaska Science Center, Anchorage, AK, United States and Christophe Barbraud, Centre d’Etudes Biologiques de Chizé (CEBC), UMR 7372 Université de la Rochelle-CNRS, Villiers-en-Bois, France

See more of: Ocean Sciences