deep mesoscale eddies in the canada basin arctic ocean 1 numerous eddies have been identified in a seven year time series of mooring observations in the canada basin arctic ocean we focus on a series of deep eddies centered at 1200 m depth and occupying up to 1500 m of the water column the deep eddies are found to be spatially localized only ever being observed at one of four mooring sites of the beaufort gyre observing system in the canada basin however despite only a few previously reported observations of deep eddies in the arctic ocean we find that they are the most prevalent eddy type at this location based on this observation together with an analysis of the temperature salinity structure and the exclusively anticyclonic rotation of the deep eddies we hypothesize that they are formed by a density driven outflow from the chukchi borderland region we also describe a simple analytical model to explain the observed vertical scales of the eddies

joint effects of boundary currents and thermohaline intrusions on the warming of atlantic water in the canada basin 1993 2007 1 the 1990 1991 influx of atlantic water both anomalously warm and in greater volume than in the past enveloped the chukchi borderland in the western canada basin by 2002 and spread across the southeastern canada basin by 2007 warmer younger more ventilated and less dense fram strait branch waters have replaced colder older and denser waters increasing the temperature of the fram strait branch core from a 50 year or more mean of 0 45 c to 0 7 c physical and geochemical data collected from 1993 to 2007 show that the two main transport mechanisms are the boundary current and thermohaline intrusions established by large thermal gradients the boundary current operates in a cyclonic direction whereas the thermohaline intrusions operate in an anticyclonic direction because of the influence of the beaufort gyre this shows that the beaufort gyre s effect on ocean circulation extends into the fram strait branch of the atlantic layer the boundary current a fully pan arctic structure is much slower in the canada basin than in basins upstream with an effective speed of 0 5 cm s the effective spreading rate of the thermohaline intrusions relative to the core is 0 2 cm s thermohaline intrusions show signs of dissipation near the northwind ridge in 2007 suggesting that as temperature gradients between inflowing and resident waters decrease they will disappear from the canada basin

wind and buoyancy induced transport of the norwegian coastal current in the barents sea 1 the focus of this study is on the fluxes and forcing of the norwegian coastal current ncc at the entrance to the barents sea the structure and dynamics of the ncc which consists of a slope branch and an offshore branch are investigated using 1 a recent 1 year full depth current meter record in the core of the slope region 2 repeated hydrographic data at an inshore monitoring station 3 broader regional hydrographic surveys and 4 atmospheric reanalysis data the total fluxes are estimated to 1 8 sv for volume and 26 msv for freshwater relative to a reference salinity of 34 8 with the largest contributions from baroclinic offshore branch the heat flux calculated for the slope branch only is 34 tw these estimates are higher compared to earlier estimates but are based on more comprehensive data the major mode of variability in the slope branch is consistent with a continental shelf wave on time scales in the range of 3 16 days forced by the along coast component of the wind stress maximum along slope currents during fall winter corresponding to the stronger wind forcing during these seasons suggest that the observed seasonality in the ncc can be attributed to a similar mechanism

mixing in the west spitsbergen current abstract twenty eight profiles of temperature and salinity down to 1 km depth have been measured in the area north from the coast of svalbard to latitude 84 40 n between 0 and 32 e longitude they show atlantic waters of the west spitsbergen current entering the arctic ocean in a bifilimentary mode one filament following the coastline and the other 300 km farther north apparently following the continental shelf break the profiles show these filaments mixing into the ambient water in a series of intrusive layers which are remarkably uniform over distances of hundreds of kilometers a triple peak structure at the atlantic water maximum is the dominant oceanographic characteristic of the area with salt fingering occurring on the upper surface of the cold intrusions and indications of double diffusive exchanges through the lower surface a system or eddies or meanders is postulated as the mechanism for the production of multiple fronts allowing the intrusive layers to extend to distances much greater t

a model for the thickness and salinity of the upper layer in the arctic ocean and the relationship between the ice thickness and some external parameters abstract this paper presents a dynamical model for the salinity and thickness of the upper layer in the arctic the parameters are the river runoff to the arctic the buoyancy supply through the bering strait the export of ice from the arctic and a parameter characterizing the vertical mixing an ice model is formulated having the following two important properties 1 the horizontal surface area of the exported ice is essentially determined by external parameters the wind field over the arctic and 2 there is a relationship between the ice thickness and the fraction of open water in the arctic the model for the upper layer and the ice model are used together with a heat budget for the arctic also including the effect of different albedo for ice and open water a relationship between the freshwater supply and the ice thickness is derived also investigated are the effects on the ice thickness of a changed export of ice area and changed properties of the flow through the bering strait it is found t

biofouling control for optical backscatter suspended sediment sensors abstract the use of optical backscatter instruments for measuring water turbidity for extended periods has been very limited due to the debilitating effect of biological fouling this is particularly the case in tropical coastal waters we describe a simple wiping mechanism attached to a logging nephelometer which can usually control fouling for up to a month even under conditions most favourable for fouling without a wiper deployment periods can be limited to only a few days scratching of the nephelometer by the wiper is not a major contributor to nephelometer error

distribution of convective lower halocline water in the eastern arctic ocean 1 we investigate the distribution of convectively formed lower halocline water clhw in the eastern arctic ocean using observational and climatological data the clhw can be defined as the water mass in the cold halocline layer formed by winter convection the presence of clhw is indicated by temperatures close to the freezing point and a sharp bend in the s curve near the salinity of clhw results from ice drifting buoy observations in 2002 show differences in water mass characteristics in the upper ocean among the amundsen basin over the arctic mid ocean ridge and in the nansen basin in 2000 2002 clhw was present over the arctic mid ocean ridge and the nansen basin but was largely absent from the amundsen basin using climatological data we find that clhw was confined to the nansen basin prior to 1990 in the early 1990s clhw still covered only the nansen basin but extended to the northern side of the arctic mid ocean ridge in the mid 1990s and covered the whole of the amundsen basin by the late 1990s in the early 2000s the area of clhw moved back to its present boundary on the northern side of the arctic mid ocean ridge these results correspond roughly to other changes in the arctic ocean circulation and water mass structure but with a time delay we hypothesize that general circulation changes and the cutoff of source water for advective convective modification of the lhw are causes of the change in clhw distribution the lag in changes to clhw distribution behind other changes in the atmosphere and upper ocean are likely related to differences in circulation change with depth and the transit time from clhw formation

arctic ocean warming and its consequences for the denmark strait overflow 1 two anomalously warm inflow pulses into the atlantic water layer of the arctic ocean have occurred since the late 1980s as a consequence temperatures of the arctic basins at 200 800 m depth have increased considerably in comparison to earlier decades the warm inflow pulses also had a low density owing to the decadal time scale of the circulation in the atlantic water layer large pools of anomalously light water have thereby formed in the arctic ocean these will slowly drain back south into the nordic seas we submit that they will be able to influence the overflows into the atlantic across the greenland scotland ridges the atlantic meridional overturning is fed by these overflows our model experiments indicate that the low density anomalies from the arctic ocean may be able to reduce the denmark strait overflow 15 25 years after the entrance of the original signal through fram strait into the arctic ocean the actual size of the reduction depends on the exact path and speed of the anomalies inside the arctic proper and on local processes in the arctic ocean and the nordic sea

arctic ocean circulation processes and water masses a description of observations and ideas with focus on the period prior to the international polar year 2007 2009 abstract the evolving knowledge of the arctic ocean its hydrography and its water masses and their transformations and circulation is reviewed starting with the observations made on fram 1893 1896 and extending to the international polar year ipy 2007 2009 the expeditions and observations after fram to the mid 20th century as well as the more extensive and systematic studies of water masses and circulation made from ice stations and airborne expeditions from the late 1940s to the late 1970s are briefly described the early concepts of the connections and exchanges between the arctic ocean and the world ocean are also discussed in the 1980s scientific icebreakers were beginning to enter the inner parts of the arctic ocean and large international programmes were launched culminating in the ipy the changes in the arctic ocean first noted in the atlantic layer in 1990 and shortly after in the upper layers are described the exchanges between the arctic ocean and the surrounding seas through the four main openings fram strait barents sea bering strait and the canadian arctic archipelago as well the volume and freshwater balances of the arctic ocean are examined

water masses and circulation in the eurasian basin results from the oden 91 expedition the oden 91 north pole expedition obtained oceanographic measurements on four sections in the nansen and amundsen basins of the eurasian basin and in the makarov basin of the canadian basin thereby proving the feasibility of carrying out a typical oceanographic program using an icebreaker in the arctic ocean the data show greater spatial variability in water structure and circulation than was apparent from previous data the results show that a clear front exists between the eurasian and canadian basins such that upper halocline water in the canadian basin is almost absent from the eurasian basin the lower halocline water produced in the barents kara sea region permeates much of the eurasian basin and flows along the continental slope into the canadian basin the deeper circulation is strongly influenced by topography three return flows of the atlantic layer are identified one over the nansen gakkel ridge one over the lomonosov ridge and a third flowing from the canadian basin the slight differences observed in salinity and temperature characteristics of the deeper waters of the nansen and amundsen basins do not lead to an obvious explanation of their origin or flow pattern

vertical heat transfer in the arctic ocean the role of double diffusive mixing 1 microstructure profiles collected in the central amundsen basin are analyzed in order to quantify the role of double diffusive mixing for vertical heat transfer from the atlantic layer in the profiles a persistent but laterally incoherent thermohaline staircase structure is identified in the 200 260 m depth range the staircase contains homogeneous layers with average height of 1 3 m and thin high gradient interfaces with average temperature and salinity jumps of about 0 065 c and 0 015 respectively when inferred from a commonly used diffusive convection parameterization the average vertical heat flux within the staircase is 0 6 w m 2 this is one order of magnitude larger than the molecular diffusion alone and of the same order as the overall heat loss from the atlantic layer in the deep basins of the arctic ocean the parameterization is evaluated using observed turbulent heat fluxes and is found to overestimate diffusive convective fluxes with up to an order of magnitude especially for weak thermal forcing small temperature jumps in staircase staircases coexist with thermohaline intrusions in the vertical temperature and salinity profiles lomonosov ridge is identified as a potential region for formation of intrusions it is found that salt fingering is the dominant process during intrusion growth whereas diffusive convection is the dominant process in maintaining the intrusions at steady state in the deep basins

distribution of atlantic and pacific waters in the upper arctic ocean implications for circulation the atlantic and pacific oceans provide source waters for the arctic ocean that can be distinguished by their differing nitrate and phosphate concentration relationships using these relationships we estimate the amount of atlantic and pacific waters in the surface layer top 30 m of the arctic ocean atlantic source water is dominant in most of the eurasian basin and is present in significant amounts in the makarov basin north of the east siberian sea pacific source water is dominant in most of the canadian basin and is present in significant amounts in the amundsen basin north of greenland we deduce circulation patterns from the distributions of atlantic and pacific source waters in the surface layer of the arctic ocean and conclude that the flow within the surface layer differs from ice drift along the north american and european boundaries of the polar basin

freshwater fluxes through the western fram strait two hydrographic and d18o transects across fram strait aug sept 1997 1998 are used to examine freshwater contributions to the east greenland current egc the egc featured up to 16 meteoric water in both years but was made comparatively more saline through the formation of up to 11 m of sea ice we derive meteoric water fluxes of 3680 km3yr 1 in aug sept 1997 and 2000 km3yr 1 in aug sept 1998 the 1997 and 1998 data show a long term me m sea ice flux through fram strait around half the long term mean meteoric water flux a 1991 d18o section bauch et al 1995 yielded a very similar ratio our 1998 section reveals fresh 1ow 6180 water on the east greenland shelf whose comparatively large volume constitutes a potentially significant contribution to the total freshwater flux through fram strait such fluxes are important to the regional and global thermohaline circulation we suggest that efforts towards monitoring both the egc and east greenland shelf waters are thus required

differentiating fluvial components of upper canada basin waters on the basis of measurements of dissolved barium combined with other physical and chemical tracers 1 the utility of dissolved barium ba as a quasi conservative tracer of arctic water masses has been demonstrated previously here we report distributions of salinity temperature and ba in the upper 200 m of the canada basin and adjacent areas observed during cruises conducted in 2003 2004 as part of the joint western arctic climate study and beaufort gyre exploration project a salinity oxygen isotope mass balance is used to calculate the relative contributions from sea ice melt meteoric and saline end members and ba measurements are incorporated to resolve the meteoric fraction into separate contributions from north american and eurasian sources of runoff large fractions of eurasian runoff as high as 15 5 were observed in the surface layer throughout the canada basin but significant amounts of north american runoff in the surface layer were only observed at the southernmost station occupied in the canada basin in 2004 nearest to the mouth of the mackenzie river smaller contributions from both eurasian and north american runoff were evident in the summer and winter pacific derived water masses that comprise the underlying upper halocline layer in the canada basin significant amounts of eurasian and north american runoff were observed throughout the water column at a station occupied in amundsen gulf in 2004 this suggests the export of runoff from both sources through the passages of the canadian arctic archipelago

arctic warming evolution and spreading of the 1990s warm event in the nordic seas and the arctic ocean 1 observations in the arctic ocean revealed changes in oceanic temperature salinity and ice cover of the 1990s as compared with earlier data with a numerical model we favorably reproduce the development and subsequent propagation of temperature anomalies in water of atlantic origin in the 1980s and 1990s these propagated into the arctic ocean via the barents sea and the fram strait two warm anomalies entered the arctic ocean through these passages while the first smaller anomaly only warmed up the western eurasian basin the second large anomaly spread far into the eastern eurasian basin and across the lomonossov ridge into the western arctic basins intensified boundary currents during the high nao state in the first half of the 1990s significantly influenced the amplitude and speed of propagation of the temperature anomalies inside the arctic ocean in contrast to the notion of a continuous warming process during the 1990s our model results suggest the warming of the atlantic layer in the arctic ocean occurred in the form of events the event with the largest anomalous heat input during the modeled period entered the arctic between 1989 and 1994 it is possible to trace back the additional heat input into the arctic to an increased volume inflow via the faroer scotland passage and reduced heat loss to the atmosphere in the early 1990s after a weaker warm inflow in the second half of the 1990s the most recent observations and the model results point to a recurring warm anomaly in the inflow from 1999 onward

waters of the makarov and canada basins abstract hydrographic measurements from the 1994 arctic ocean section show how the makarov and canada basins of the arctic ocean are related and demonstrate their oceanographic connections to the eurasian basin the inflow into the makarov basin consists largely of well ventilated water within a broad band of densities from a boundary flow over the siberian end of the lomonosov ridge the boundary flow contains a significant component of dense shelf water likely originating in the barents kara and laptev seas earlier ice camp data show that the canada basin is relatively more isolated from this ventilation source in the canada basin shelf sources influenced by bering sea water appear to add cold waters with high silicate concentrations to the halocline and deeper in 1994 the halocline silicate maximum over the central makarov basin was absent evidence of the recent displacement of the upper s 33 1 halocline water from the chukchi east siberian sea region by water from the eurasian basin much of the makarov basin water in and below the halocline is in fact from the eurasian basin with admixture of waters from the canada basin suggested by their higher silicate concentrations mid depth eddies may transport anomalous properties into the central arctic and create property gradients or fronts in mid depth and deep waters the complex topography of the mendeleyev ridge chukchi plateau region also may assist spreading of water from the boundary into the interior atlantic layer characteristics in 1994 differed from previous general depictions in particular the core temperatures at the chukchi mendeleyev boundary were at least 0 2 c warmer on average than indicated in earlier work the recent warming at intermediate depth has resulted from inflow of atlantic waters that have been cooled relatively little during their transit of the norwegian sea

volume and freshwater transports through the canadian arctic archipelago baffin bay system 1 baffin bay connects the arctic ocean and the labrador sea it receives polar water through the canadian arctic archipelago and by the west greenland current the polar water is after transformation exported through davis strait with control sections both upstream and downstream baffin bay invites the use of an idealized geostrophic approach to estimate transports the baroclinic transports driven by the density differences between the arctic ocean and baffin bay are first determined the density and upper layer depth are assumed the same in lancaster sound nares strait and the west greenland current once the baroclinic transports are estimated the sea level difference between the arctic ocean and baffin bay is computed next the upper layer depth in nares strait and the west greenland current is reduced while the sea level difference is kept constant this allows for deep inflows through nares strait and the west greenland current to establish a deep outflow through davis strait a barotropic sea level slope between the arctic ocean and the labrador sea is estimated from two ideal water columns the transports are computed for different salinities in the polar water and the salinity giving mass balance in the deeper layers is determined the effects of possible increased melting of the greenland icecap are examined if the meltwater is added directly to baffin bay the effects are small but if it is incorporated in the east and west greenland current a significant reduction of the outflow through the archipelago might occur

velocity field of the western entrance to the barents sea 1 by the use of 4 year long records from moored current meters between 71 30 n and 73 30 n of the western entrance to the barents sea the velocity field of the atlantic inflow is examined the mean velocity field shows the atlantic inflow as a wide core that occupies most of this section but the general picture is a velocity field that is dominated by large and frequent fluctuations the key parameter that to a large degree determines the spatial distribution of the velocity field is sea level changes within the section that are induced by the local wind field the main process is the ekman transport through its ability to accumulate water thereby creating strong gradients of barotropic pressure and associated currents southwesterly winds along the norwegian coast and southeasterly winds farther north will in general create wide inflows while northerly winds will result in wide outflows these flow regimes may be persistent for up to 2 3 weeks and are related to the relative strength and lateral extension of the icelandic low and the arctic high although the alignment of the local isobars must be considered in order to be able to describe the details of the flow

pathways of pacific water across the chukchi sea a numerical model study 1 pathways of pacific water flowing from the north pacific ocean through bering strait and across the chukchi sea are investigated using a two dimensional barotropic model in the no wind case the flow is driven only by a prescribed steady northward flow of 0 8 sv through bering strait the resulting steady state circulation consists of a broad northeasterly flow basically following the topography with a few areas of intensified currents about half of the inflow travels northwest through hope valley while the other half turns somewhat toward the northeast along the alaskan coast the flow through hope valley is intensified as it passes through herald canyon but much of this flow escapes the canyon to move eastward joining the flow in the broad valley between herald and hanna shoals another area of slightly intensified currents there is a confluence of nearly all of the flow along the alaskan coast west of pt barrow to create a very strong and narrow coastal jet that follows the shelf topography eastward onto the beaufort shelf thus in this no wind case nearly all of the pacific water entering the chukchi sea eventually ends up flowing eastward along the narrow beaufort shelf with no discernable flow across the shelf edge toward the interior canada basin travel times for water parcels to move from bering strait to pt barrow vary tremendously according to the path taken e g less than 6 months along the alaskan coast but about 30 months along the westernmost path through herald canyon this flow field is relatively insensitive to idealized wind forcing when the winds are from the south west or north in which cases the shelf transports tend to be intensified however strong northeasterly to easterly winds are able to completely reverse the flows along the beaufort shelf and the alaskan coast and force most of the throughflow in a more northerly direction across the chukchi sea shelf edge potentially supplying the surface waters of the interior canada basin with pacific water the entire shelf circulation reacts promptly to changing wind conditions with a response time of 2 3 days the intense coastal jet between icy cape and pt barrow implies that dense water formed here from winter coastal polynyas may be quickly swept away along the coast in contrast there is a relatively quiet nearshore region to the west between cape lisburne and icy cape where dense water may accumulate much longer and continue to become denser before it is carried across the shelf

evidence for solar influence in a holocene speleothem record pere noel cave se belgium abstract we present a decadal centennial scale holocene climate record based on trace elements contents from a 65 cm stalagmite from belgian pere noel cave pere noel pn stalagmite covers the last 12 7 ka according to u th dating high spatial resolution measurements of trace elements sr ba and mg were done by laser ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry la icp ms trace elements profiles were interpreted as environmental and climate changes in the han sur lesse region power spectrum estimators and continuous wavelet transform were applied on trace elements time series to detect any statistically significant periodicities in the pn stalagmite spectral analyses reveal decadal to millennial periodicities i e 68 75 133 136 198 209 291 358 404 602 912 1029 and 2365 2670 yr in the speleothem record results were compared to reconstructed sunspot number data to determine whether solar signal is presents in pn speleothem the occurrence of significant solar periodicities i e cycles of gleissberg de vries unnamed 500 years eddy and hallstatt supports for an impact of solar forcing on pn speleothem trace element contents moreover several intervals of significant rapid winter change were detected during the holocene at 10 3 9 3 9 5 around 8 2 6 4 6 2 4 7 4 5 and around 2 7 ka bp those intervals are similar to the cold winter events evidenced in different natural paleoclimate archives suggesting common climate forcing mechanisms related to changes in solar irradiance

relaxation of central arctic ocean hydrography to pre 1990s climatology 1 upper ocean hydrography in the central arctic ocean has relaxed since 2000 to near climatological conditions that pertained before the dramatic changes of the 1990s the behavior of the anomalies of temperature and salinity in the central arctic ocean follow a first order linear response to the ao with time constant of 5 years and a delay of 3 years

circulation features in the central arctic ocean revealed by nuclear fuel reprocessing tracers from scientific ice expeditions 1995 and 1996 measurements of the tracer radionuclides 129 i and 137 cs were conducted on seawater samples collected during the scientific ice expedition cruises to the arctic ocean of the u s navy nuclear submarines uss cavalla and uss pogy in 1995 and 1996 respectively these radionuclides are derived mainly from discharges from the sellafield england united kingdom and la hague france nuclear fuel reprocessing plants and are subsequently transported with atlantic water into the arctic ocean through fram strait and the barents sea iodine 129 results from halocline waters water depths of 59 and 134 m collected virtually synoptically throughout the central arctic ocean during the uss cavalla cruise clearly show the front between atlantic origin water having high 129 i levels 100 10 7 atoms l 1 and pacific origin water labeled mainly by fallout 30 10 7 atoms l 1 measured in central regions of the canada basin indicate that the interior is more efficiently ventilated than previously thought possibly by separation from boundary currents flowing over the continental margin north of the chukchi plateau the 129 i and 137 cs data were interpreted using a transit time model that provided estimates of 6 7 years 0 5 years for the passage of halocline and atlantic water from the norwegian coastal current 60 n to the continental slope of the makarov basin and a lower limit of 8 years for transport to interior regions of the makarov and amundsen basins

wind forcing of volume transport through lancaster sound 1 volume and freshwater transport through lancaster sound are estimated from mooring measurements collected in eastern barrow strait for 13 years between 1998 and 2011 estimates from 2006 to 2011 confirm the relationship between surface wind and volume transport derived from data collected between 1998 and 2006 volume transport through barrow strait along the northwest passage is significantly correlated with northeastward winds in the beaufort sea parallel to the western coasts of the canadian arctic archipelago at monthly to interannual time scales the location and wind direction for which there is maximum correlation are consistent with the flow being driven by a sea level difference between opposite ends of the passage and the difference being determined by setup caused by alongshore winds in the beaufort sea monthly alongshore wind anomalies account for 43 of the variance of the transport anomalies p 0 05 the annual cycles of the total volume transport and its part attributed to the beaufort sea wind both have peaks in the summer and are lowest in the autumn correlations of the volume transport anomaly with ice velocity anomalies are lower than with surface wind anomalies

temperature difference across the lomonosov ridge implications for the atlantic water circulation in the arctic ocean 1 drifting buoy observations in the arctic ocean indicate that unlike climatological conditions the temperature of the upper atlantic water was higher in the makarov basin side of the lomonosov ridge than in the amundsen basin side in 2004 hydrographic data from 1991 to 2004 has been compared with climatology to examine the relative phase of atlantic water temperature change in these regions on the amundsen basin side of the lomonosov ridge a positive temperature anomaly in the atlantic water began in the early 1990s continued from the mid 1990s to the early 2000s and started decreasing in 2004 in contrast positive temperature anomalies were first apparent on the makarov basin side of the lomonosov ridge in 2000 and continue in 2004 recent historical data indicates that the arrival of temperature anomalies on the makarov basin side of the lomonosov ridge is delayed about 7 years after arrival on the amundsen basin side our results support the idea that atlantic water circulates cyclonically around the periphery of the makarov basin at a propagation speed of 1 2 cm s 1

atmospheric forcing on the canadian arctic archipelago freshwater outflow and implications for the labrador sea variability the variability of the freshwater export through the canadian arctic archipelago caa is analyzed using a hindcast simulation forced by surface atmospheric forcing from the era40 reanalysis 1958 2001 although the two channels representing the archipelago in the model are both sensitive to the along channel sea surface height ssh gradient they appear to have very distinct behaviors the outflow to lancaster sound is shown to be largely controlled by the magnitude of the upstream ssh gradient across mcclure strait the gradient shows a close link to the wind stress curl in the western arctic but also to a large scale ssh anomaly pattern which has a strong signal over the shelf to the south of mcclure strait the latter has however little statistical connection to the ssh variability in the beaufort gyre by contrast the outflow through nares strait responds preferentially to ssh variations in the northern baffin bay which are remotely forced by air sea heat exchanges in the labrador sea the variability is largely coherent between the two outflows and is controlled by a dipolar atmospheric pattern reminiscent of the north atlantic arctic oscillation when entering the subpolar gyre the caa freshwater outflow remains confined to the labrador shelf with little impact on the salinity of the interior labrador sea and potentially on the convection the latter is represented by a distinct mode of salinity variability in the western subpolar gyre which is rather influenced by the variability of the sea ice export through fram strait