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Modelling of Kealey Ice Rise, Antarctica, reveals stable ice-flow conditions in East Ellsworth Land over millennia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 July 2017

Carlos Martín
Affiliation:
British Antarctic Survey, Natural Environment Research Council, Cambridge, UK E-mail: cama@bas.ac.uk
G. Hilmar Gudmundsson
Affiliation:
British Antarctic Survey, Natural Environment Research Council, Cambridge, UK E-mail: cama@bas.ac.uk
Edward C. King
Affiliation:
British Antarctic Survey, Natural Environment Research Council, Cambridge, UK E-mail: cama@bas.ac.uk
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Abstract

Flow at ice divides, their shape, size and internal structure depend not only on local conditions, but also on the flow regimes and past histories of the surrounding ice masses. Here we use field data from Kealey Ice Rise, Ellsworth Land, West Antarctica, in combination with flow modelling to investigate any possible signs of transients in the flow of the surrounding ice masses. Kealey Ice Rise shows linear surface features running parallel to its ridge in satellite imagery and a conspicuous layering in the ground-penetrating radar data known as double-peaked Raymond bumps. Through numerical modelling, by using an anisotropic full-Stokes thermomechanical flow solver, we analyse the evolution of Kealey Ice Rise and the timescales involved. We conclude that the features observed in the stratigraphy of Kealey Ice Rise require at least 3 ka of near-stationary flow conditions. However, we cannot exclude the possibility of a recent flow reorganization in the last century. We stress that the signs of stationary flow in radar stratigraphy observed in Kealey Ice Rise have been observed in other ice divides in the East Ellsworth Land area, suggesting stationary flow conditions over a millennial timescale in the region.

Information

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © International Glaciological Society 2009
Figure 0

Fig. 1. MODIS Mosaic of Antarctica (MOA) image map (Haran and others, 2005), showing the Ellsworth Land area around Kealey Ice Rise (delineated in yellow). The fast-flowing areas are highlighted from Rignot and others’ (2011) velocity map. The locations of ground-penetrating radar (GPR) profiles M, K and L are shown in blue, red and green, respectively.

Figure 1

Fig. 2. GPR profiles M, K and L at Kealey Ice Rise (see Fig. 1 for location). Some internal horizons are highlighted in red and the bedrock topography in blue. The bedrock topography in profile M was extracted from BEDMAP bed topography (Lythe and others, 2001).

Figure 2

Table 1. Numerical values of the parameters used in the simulations

Figure 3

Fig. 3. Representation of the laboratory experiments by Pimienta and others (1987) in the model parameter space. The parameters are the rheological index n and the relative viscosity β. The red line represents the result that ice with single-maximum fabric is ten times softer to deform perpendicularly to the c –axis than isotropic ice, and the green line that ice exhibiting a single-maximum fabric is ten times harder to deform in the c-axis direction than the isotropic ice. The blue circles represent the values used in this study.

Figure 4

Fig. 4. Steady-state ice stratigraphy (isochrones) for an ice divide over a flat bedrock for different values of the rheological index n and relative viscosity. The parameters chosen are shown in Figure 3. They are n = 2 and β =0.02 in the left panel, n = 3 and β =0.10 in the central panel and n = 4 and β =0.27 in the right panel.

Figure 5

Fig. 5. Sensitivity of age versus depth distribution to (a) rheological index n and (b) relative viscosity β. Solid lines represent the age– depth distribution predicted by the model using β = 0.1 for the sensitivity analysis of n, and n = 3 for the sensitivity analysis of β. We compare the modelled age vs depth distribution at the divide with the estimated age of the picked radar reflecting horizons. We estimate the age of radar horizons at the margins where the effect of flow and fabric evolution is minimal (Martin and Gudmundsson, 2012), and represent the horizontal variation of the one-dimensional age estimates along the radar layers as an interval.

Figure 6

Fig. 6. Modelled isochrones (black) and radar layers (red) at profile M (see Fig. 1). n = 3 and β = 0. 1.

Figure 7

Fig. 7. Modelled isochrones (black) and radar layers (red) at profile K (see Fig. 1). n = 3 and β = 0. 1.

Figure 8

Fig. 8. Modelled isochrones (black) and radar layers (red) at profile L (see Fig. 1). n = 3 and β = 0. 1.