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Saline outflow from the Arctic Ocean: Its contribution to the deep waters of the Greenland, Norwegian, and Iceland seas

K. Aagaard

Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory, NOAA, Seattle, WA

E. Fahrbach

Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research, Bremerhaven, FRG

J. Meincke

Institute for Marine Research, University of Hamburg, Hamburg, FRG

J.H. Swift

Scripps Institution of Oceanography, La Jolla, CA

Journal of Geophysical Research, 96(C11), 20,433-20,441(1991)
Copyright ©1991 by the American Geophysical Union. Further electronic distribution is not allowed.

Gallery of Figures and Tables

Figure 1. Hydrographic stations extending below 500 m, June 1987. The reference station for Norwegian Sea deep water characteristics shown in Figure 3 is denoted by the solid circle marked I. Mooring locations during 1987-1988 used to define the eastward recirculation of water from the East Greenland Current are shown by the three triangles labeled GS, and locations of moorings during 1987-1989 used to estimate transport in the saline core over the Greenland slope are shown by the two unlabeled triangles.

Figure 2. Salinity distribution below about 500 m in the section between 75°-76°N (see inset for location). The most saline portion of the Arctic Ocean outflow is centered near 1200 m.

Figure 3. Potential temperature-salinity characteristics below 800 m at stations 231, 233, and 264. These stations respectively represent the Greenland slope where the Arctic Ocean outflow of highest salinity is found, the region near the base of the slope containing multiple reduced salinity maxima, and the central Greenland Sea in the region of deep winter convection where the deep water is the freshest. Plotting intervals for stations 321 and 233 are 50 m above 1900 m and 100 below 1900 m depths, plotting intervals for station 264 are 100 m over the entire depth range. The numbers 1, 2, and 3 denote the salinity maximum type (see text), and the solid lines represent the associated isopycnals at surface pressure.

Figure 4. Potential temperature/salinity characteristics at the depth of the intermediate salinity maximum (solid circles with station numbers); the line LR shows their linear regression. At some stations there was more than one salinity maximum of type 1. The two lighter lines represent isopycnals at 1500 and 2500 db. The lighter solid circles labeled with their observation depths show the potential temperature/salinity characteristics below 1300 m at stations 203 and 204 (see Figure 1 for locations). The open circles denote type 3 salinity maxima. The deep water characteristics of the Greenland Sea (GSDW), Norwegian Sea (NSDW) and the adjacent Arctic Ocean (EBDW) are respectively derived from observations below 3300 m at station 264, from observations below 2500 m at the Norwegian Sea intercalibration station (denoted I in Figure 1) ,and from Swift and Koltermann [1988].

Figure 5. Salinity at the depth of the intermediate salinity maximum; only the last three digits are shown. Heavy lines denoted by five digits show the distribution of the salinity on an isopycnal surface corresponding approximately to the midpoint of the regression line in Figure 4.

Figure 6. Distribution below 800 m of salinity, dissolved oxygen, and nutrients at two stations in the core of the saline Arctic Ocean outflow (see Figure 1 for locations).

Figure 7. Dissolved oxygen-salinity characteristics at the depth of the intermediate salinity maximum; the line LR shows their linear regression. The characteristics of the deep Greenland Sea (GSDW) and of the outflow from the Arctic Ocean of the type 1 salinity maximum (203/1579 m) are respectively derived from samples at 3337 m at station 264 and at 1579 m at station 203.

Figure 8. Potential temperature-salinity characteristics at a site in the central Greenland Sea during 1982 and 1989, together with the depth of each observation. The inset shows the change in properties from 1982 to 1989, with positive values representing warming and increasing salinity.

Table 1. Greenland Sea moorings June 1987 to June 1988 (low-pass filtered).


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