Standard meteorological measurements on board of POLARSTERN during expedition ANT-IV (PS08, 4 cruises, south summer 1985/86) in the Atlantic and Weddell Sea, Antarctica

During the fourth Antarctic voyage ANT-IV of the research icebreaker POLARSTERN standard meteorological measurements have been performed. The measurements include 3-hourly synoptic observations as well as daily upper air soundings. The measurements started on September 6 1985 at Bremerhaven and were terminated at April 28 1986 in Punta Arenas. The 3-hourly synoptic observations are performed following the instructions of the FM 13 ships code defined by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). The datasets include automatic measurements such as mean ship's speed, wind velocity, wind direction, air temperature, water temperature as well as visual observations such as total cloud amount, present weather, clouds, height and period of swell waves, ice classification. The visual observation are not performed during night time. For the upper air soundings VAISALA RS80 radiosondes, carried by helium-filled balloons (TOTEX 350 - 1500) were used. Data reception and evaluation were carried out by a MicroCora System (VAISALA). The upper air soundings include profile measurements of pressure, temperature, relative humidity and wind vector. Usually the soundings started at the heliport (10 m above sea level) and terminated between 15 and 37 km. The height of the measurements was calculated by applying the barometric formula. The wind vector was determined with the aid of the OMEGA navigation system.

High resolved snow height measurements at Neumayer Station, Antarctica, 2013

Antarctica is a continent with a strong character. High wind speeds, very low temperatures and heavy snow storms. All these parameters are well known due to observations and measurements, but precipitation measurements are still rare because the number of manned stations is very limited in Antarctica. In such a polar snow region many wind driven phenomena associated with snow fall exist like snow drift, blowing snow or sastrugi. Snow drift is defined as a layer of snow formed by the wind during a snowstorm. The horizontal visibility is below eye level. Blowing snow is specified as an ensemble of snow particles raised by the wind to moderate or great heights above the ground; the horizontal visibility at eye level is generally very poor (National Snow And Ice Data Center (NSIDC), 2013). Sastrugi are complex, fragile and sharp ridges or grooves formed on land or over sea ice. They arise from wind erosion, saltation of snow particles and deposition. To get more details about these procedures better instruments than the conventional stake array are required. This small report introduces a new measuring technique and therefore offers a never used dataset of snow heights. It is very common to measure the snow height with a stake array in Antarctica (f.e. Neumayer Station, Kohnen Station) but not with a laser beam. Thus the idea was born to install a new instrument in December 2012 at Neumayer Station.