Abstract:
McMurdo Sound forms a natural and accessible laboratory for understanding the fundamental processes that underpin ice-ocean interactions. How changes in the sea ice sheet affect the physical oceanography of McMurdo Sound and Antarctica's coastal seas in general was investigated. A simultaneous set of ocean current, temperature and salinity was measured to provide a coherent snapshot of the sounds
... oceanography. Several moorings were deployed over several seasons with a string of instruments running from the surface to the bottom (varying each year) including current meters, temperature recorders, microcat CTD profiles and acoustic doppler current profilers (ADCP). Thermistors were deployed at 5, 35, 200, 250 and 345 m depths, current meters at 30 and 350 m and microcat temperature and conductivity loggers at 10, 50 and 250 m. An acoustic doppler current profiler (ADCP) provides measurements of velocity at multiple depths and were deployed simultaneously at several sites. Measurements of salinity and temperature were collected using CTD instruments and CTD profiles were collected during various periods of the tide. Conductivity and temperature data was collected using a CT arm which when in position gives salinity and temperature measurements in the ocean, 10-15 cm from the bottom of the sea ice sheet. Turbulence velocimeters were deployed at 10 and 30 m to measure velocity on centimetre scales. A Scamp temperature and salinity profiler was deployed repeatedly to collect temperature and salinity. It measures data while sinking, allowing it to measure on centimetre scales over the top 90 m of the water column. 
