Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Wind and temperature regime along the slope of Adelie Land, Antarctica

1986; American Geophysical Union; Volume: 91; Issue: D6 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1029/jd091id06p06735

2156-2202

Yuji Kodama, Gerd Wendler,

Polar Research and Ecology

An analysis was made of data collected from automatic weather stations (AWS) on the slope of Adelie Land, Antarctica. The data were collected simultaneously at different stations on the ice‐covered slope of the continent, where no data have previously been obtained. The stations are classified into three groups according to their location (high plateau, intermediate plateau, or coastal region), each having distinct annual temperature and wind speed regimes. These classifications also correspond well to the stations' slopes. Change in surface air temperature along the slope with respect to height was smaller than −1°C/100 m between the high plateau and the intermediate plateau stations. The wind directions did not follow Ball's model, which suggests the importance of the gradient of surface potential air temperature along the slope on the wind regime. A scale analysis showed the condition in which the gradient of surface potential air temperature along the slope should not be considered negligible when considering the total pressure gradient force. This condition in turn indicates that the entrainment of momentum across the top of the katabatic wind layer is also important.