Basal crevasse formation on Byrd Glacier, East Antarctica, as proxy for past subglacial flooding events

10 pages, 4 figures, supporting information https://doi.org/10.1029/2020GL090978.-- Data Availability Statement: The processed GPS data used in this study is available from Mendeley Data Repository: http://dx.doi.org/10.17632/2kk69m98fd.1. The raw GPS data will be made available via the National Science Foundation's US Antarctic Program Data Center. The gridded CReSIS products are available via https://data.cresis.ku.edu/data/grids/. The data is available through: http://data.pgc.umn.edu/elev/dem/setsm/REMA/geocell/v1.0/2m
Linear elastic fracture mechanics suggests that short-lived flow accelerations, such as the one initiated by a flooding event beneath Byrd Glacier in 2006, can form abnormally large basal crevasses at the grounding line. Airborne radar measurements acquired in 2011 reveal hundreds of basal crevasses ranging in height from urn:x-wiley:00948276:media:grl62752-math-000140–335 m. Particle tracking results show that formation of the largest basal crevasse occurred at the grounding line during the 2006 flooding event. Very large basal crevasses form distinctive surface depressions directly overhead, which are observed along the Byrd Glacier flowline to the terminus of the Ross Ice Shelf. By using these surface depressions as proxies for abnormally large basal crevasses, we create a timeline of past subglacial flooding events on Byrd Glacier. Understanding the frequency of flooding events and their effect on glacier dynamics will help inform models of ice sheet stability and subglacial hydrology
This research was funded by NSF grants ANT0944087 and ANT1255488 awarded to L. A. Stearns. Gordon S. Hamilton was instrumental in the collection and analysis of the GPS data. The radar data was collected and generated by the Center of Remote Sensing of Ice Sheets from the support of the University of Kansas, NSF grant ANT0424589 and NASA Operation IceBridge grant NNX16AH54G available from: https://data.cresis.ku.edu/data/rds/2011_Antarctica_TO/. The surface elevation data were supplied by the Byrd Polar, Climate Research Center, and the Polar Geospatial Center under NSF-OPP awards 1543501, 1810976, 1542736, 1559691, 1043681, 1541332, 0753663, 1548562, 1238993 and NASA award NNX10AN61G
With the institutional support of the ‘Severo Ochoa Centre of Excellence’ accreditation (CEX2019-000928-S)