Subsurface melting of a free-floating Antarctic iceberg

Observations near a large tabular iceberg in the Weddell Sea in March and April 2009 show evidence that water from ice melting below the surface is dispersed in two distinct ways. Warm, salty anomalies in T–S diagrams suggest that water from the permanent thermocline is transported vertically as a result of turbulent entrainment of meltwater at the iceberg's base. Stepped profiles of temperature, salinity, and density in the seasonal thermocline are more characteristic of double-diffusive processes that transfer meltwater horizontally away from the vertical ice face. These processes contribute comparable amounts of meltwater–O(0.1 m3) to the upper 200 m of a 1 m2 water column–but only basal melting results in significant upwelling of water from below the Winter Water layer into the seasonal thermocline, suggesting that these two processes may have different effects on vertical nutrient transport near an iceberg.