File:SENSIBLE AND LATENT HEAT FLUXES ACROSS THE MARGINAL ICE ZONE AND IRMINGER CURRENT (IA sensibleandlaten1094564096).pdf

Sensible and latent heat fluxes over the Marginal Ice Zone (MIZ) are an area of active research. Polar lows that develop near the MIZ have far-reaching impacts on shipping and personnel but are often misrepresented by models of the atmosphere. The accurate simulation of polar lows depends on adequate representation of energy transport between the atmosphere and ocean. Fluxes were explored with respect to ice concentration near the Irminger Current, located north of Iceland, with atmospheric measurements taken from the NPS Twin Otter aircraft. Because no widely accepted method exists for computing fluxes over a dynamic, ice-covered ocean surface that not only varies in surface roughness but also the damping effect of ice, a dynamic Charnock number that was dependent on ice concentration—in lieu of a constant Charnock number—was tested. However, ice concentration could not be derived using in situ atmospheric measurements or sea surface temperatures. Thousands of high-resolution photographs were taken of the surface from flight level, and a machine learning (ML) technique was applied to the photographs to efficiently identify ice and open water in order to estimate ice concentration.