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The Ross Ice Shelf, West Antarctica, experienced an extensive melt event in January 2016. We examine the representation of this event by the HIRHAM5 and MetUM high-resolution regional atmospheric models, as well as a sophisticated offline-coupled firn model forced with their outputs. The model results are compared with satellite-based estimates of melt days. The firn model estimates of the number of melt days are in good agreement with the observations over the eastern and central sectors of the ice shelf, while the HIRHAM5 and MetUM estimates based on their own surface schemes are considerably underestimated, possibly due to deficiencies in these schemes and an absence of spin-up. However, the firn model simulates sustained melting over the western sector of the ice shelf, in disagreement with the observations that show this region as being a melt-free area. This is attributed to deficiencies in the HIRHAM5 and MetUM output and particularly a likely overestimation of night-time net surface radiative flux. This occurs in response to an increase in night-time downwelling longwave flux from around 180–200 to 280 W m -2 over the course of a few days, leading to an excessive amount of energy at the surface available for melt. Satellite-based observations show that this change coincides with a transition from clear-sky to cloudy conditions, with clouds containing both liquid water and ice water. The models capture the initial clear-sky conditions but seemingly struggle to correctly represent cloud properties associated with the cloudy conditions, which we suggest is responsible for the radiative flux errors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ice fractures when subject to stress that exceeds the material failure strength. Previous studies have found that a von Mises failure criterion, which places a bound on the second invariant of the deviatoric stress tensor, is consistent with empirical data. Other studies have suggested that a scaling effect exists, such that larger sample specimens have a substantially lower failure strength, implying that estimating material strength from laboratory-scale experiments may be insufficient for glacier-scale modeling. In this paper, we analyze the stress conditions in crevasse onset regions to better understand the failure criterion and strength relevant for large-scale modeling. The local deviatoric stress is inferred using surface velocities and reanalysis temperatures, and crevasse onset regions are extracted from a remotely sensed crevasse density map. We project the stress state onto the failure plane spanned by Haigh–Westergaard coordinates, showing how failure depends on mode of stress. We find that existing crevasse data are consistent with a Schmidt–Ishlinsky failure criterion that places a bound on the absolute value of the maximal principal deviatoric stress, estimated to be 158±44 kPa. Although the traditional von Mises failure criterion also provides an adequate fit to the data with a von Mises strength of 265±73 kPa, it depends only on stress magnitude and is indifferent to the specific stress state, unlike Schmidt–Ishlinsky failure which has a larger shear failure strength compared to tensile strength. Implications for large-scale ice flow and fracture modeling are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Surface melt on the Greenland ice sheet has been increasing in intensity and extent over the last decades due to Arctic atmospheric warming. Surface melt depends on the surface energy balance, which includes the atmospheric forcing but also the thermal budget of the snow, firn and ice near the ice sheet surface. The temperature of the ice sheet subsurface has been used as an indicator of the thermal state of the ice sheet's surface. Here, we present a compilation of 4612 measurements of firn and ice temperature at 10 m below the surface (T10m) across the ice sheet, spanning from 1912 to 2022. The measurements are either instantaneous or monthly averages. We train an artificial neural network model (ANN) on 4597 of these point observations, weighted by their relative representativity, and use it to reconstruct T10m over the entire Greenland ice sheet for the period 1950–2022 at a monthly timescale. We use 10-year averages and mean annual values of air temperature and snowfall from the ERA5 reanalysis dataset as model input. The ANN indicates a Greenland-wide positive trend of T10m at 0.2 ∘ C per decade during the 1950–2022 period, with a cooling during 1950–1985 (-0.4 ∘ C per decade) followed by a warming during 1985–2022 (+0.7 ∘ per decade). Regional climate models HIRHAM5, RACMO2.3p2 and MARv3.12 show mixed results compared to the observational T10m dataset, with mean differences ranging from -0.4 ∘ C (HIRHAM) to 1.2 ∘ C (MAR) and root mean squared differences ranging from 2.8 ∘ C (HIRHAM) to 4.7 ∘ C (MAR). The observation-based ANN also reveals an underestimation of the subsurface warming trends in climate models for the bare-ice and dry-snow areas. The subsurface warming brings the Greenland ice sheet surface closer to the melting point, reducing the amount of energy input required for melting. Our compilation documents the response of the ice sheet subsurface to atmospheric warming and will enable further improvements of models used for ice sheet mass loss assessment and reduce the uncertainty in projections. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract. The Ross Ice Shelf, West Antarctica, experienced an extensive melt event in January 2016. We examine the representation of this event by the HIRHAM5 and MetUM high-resolution regional atmospheric models, as well as a sophisticated offline coupled firn model forced with their outputs. The model results are compared with satellite-based estimates of melt days. The firn model estimates of the number of melt days are in good agreement with the observations over the eastern and central sectors of the ice shelf, while the HIRHAM5 and MetUM estimates based on their own surface schemes are considerably underestimated, possibly due to deficiencies in these schemes and an absence of spin-up. However, the firn model simulates sustained melting over the western sector of the ice shelf, in disagreement with the observations that show this region as being melt-free. This is attributed to deficiencies in the HIRHAM5 and MetUM output, and particularly a likely overestimation of nighttime net surface radiative flux. This occurs in response to an increase in nighttime downwelling longwave flux from around 180-200 W m-2 to 280 W m-2 over the course of a few days, leading to an excessive amount of energy at the surface available for melt. Satellite-based observations show that this change coincides with a transition from clear-sky conditions to clouds containing both liquid-water and ice-water. The models capture the initial clear-sky conditions but seemingly struggle to correctly represent the ice-to-liquid mass partitioning associated with the cloudy conditions, which we suggest is responsible for the radiative flux errors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ice fractures when subject to stress that exceeds the material failure strength. Previous studies have found that a von Mises failure criterion, which places a bound on the second invariant of the deviatoric stress tensor, is consistent with empirical data. Other studies have suggested that a scaling effect exists, such that larger sample specimens have a substantially lower failure strength, implying that estimating material strength from laboratory-scale experiments may be insufficient for glacier-scale modelling. In this paper, we analyze the stress conditions in crevasse onset regions to better understand the failure criterion and strength relevant for large-scale modelling. The local deviatoric stress is inferred using surface velocities and reanalysis temperatures, and crevasse onset regions are extracted from a remotely sensed crevasse density map. We project the stress state onto the failure plane spanned by Haigh–Westergaard coordinates, showing how failure depends on mode of stress. We find that existing crevasse data is consistent with a Schmidt–Ishlinsky failure criterion that places a bound on the absolute value of the maximal principal deviatoric stress, estimated to be (158 ± 44) kPa. Although the traditional von Mises failure criterion also provides an adequate fit to the data with a von Mises strength of (265 ± 73) kPa, it depends only on stress magnitude and is indifferent to the specific stress state, unlike Schmidt–Ishlinsky failure which has a larger shear failure strength compared to tensile strength. Implications for large-scale ice-flow and fracture modelling are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The surface melting of the Greenland ice sheet has been increasing over the last decades due to Arctic atmospheric warming. Surface melt depends on the energy balance which includes the atmospheric forcing but also the thermal budget of the snow, firn and ice near the ice sheet surface. We present a compilation of more than 4500 measurements of ice, snow and firn temperature at 10 m below the surface (T10m) across Greenland spanning from 1912 to 2022. The measurements are either instantaneous or monthly averages. We train an Artificial Neural Network model (ANN) on these observations, weighted by their relative representativity, and use it to reconstruct T10m over the entire Greenland ice sheet. We use 10 year averages and mean annual values of air temperature and snowfall from the ERA5 reanalysis dataset (1950-2022) as model input. The ANN indicates a Greenland-wide positive trend of T10m at 0.2 °C decade-1 during the 1950-2022 period, with a cooling during 1950-1985 (-0.3 °C decade-1) followed by a warming during 1985-2022 (+0.7 °C decade-1). Regional climate models HIRHAM5, RACMO2.3p2 and MARv3.12 show mixed results compared to the observational T10m dataset with mean differences ranging from -0.4 oC (HIRHAM) to 1.3 °C (MAR) and root mean squared differences ranging from 2.8 °C (HIRHAM) to 4.7 °C (MAR). The corresponding values for the ANN are -0.2 °C and 1.7 °C. The observation-based ANN also reveals an underestimation of the subsurface warming trends in climate models for the bare ice and dry snow areas. The subsurface warming brings the Greenland ice sheet surface closer to the melting point, reducing the amount of summer energy input required for melting. Our compilation documents the response of the ice sheet subsurface to atmospheric warming and will enable further improvements of models used for ice sheet mass loss assessment and reduce the uncertainty in projections. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]