TASMAN GLACIER ICE CORE DRILLING OCT '04
Scientists from four countries will spend the next three weeks drilling a deep ice core from the top of the Tasman Glacier to find out what New Zealand's climate was like during the past 400 years. Glaciers store climate records - temperature, rainfall, wind speed and direction - surprisingly well. The project will help in understanding Southern Hemisphere climate patterns over the past four centuries.
Four year's planning comes to fruition this spring for GNS researchers with a multi-national project to collect a deep ice core from the top of the Tasman Glacier in the Southern Alps. The 150m-long ice core will fill a much-needed requirement for mid-latitude climate records to help international researchers better understand global climate patters over the past 500 years.
The project will make a major contribution to international climate research. In collaboration with a team from the University of Maine and the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the researchers aim to recover about 150m of ice in one metre sections from the Tasman Glacier.
Analysis of the recovered ice core will enable researchers to compile a detailed reconstruction of New Zealand's climate during the past 500 years. Analytical techniques will include four different isotope measurements, and the study of volcanic ash layers (tephra), pollen grains, and diatoms.
Glaciers hold detailed and systematic records of climate and environmental conditions. In particular, they hold records of climate-forcing agents such as CO2, CH4, dust, aerosols, and solar irradiance. They also contain records of climate responses such as rainfall, temperature, and wind strength.
New Zealand's Southern Alps and the Andes provide the only mid-latitude glacial records in the Southern Hemisphere. The international climate research community is looking to climate records from New Zealand and Antarctica to answer questions about the role of the Southern Hemisphere in global climate.
Cyclonic weather patterns that circulate around Antarctica have as much
influence on our climate as the tropical systems that bring El Nino and
La Nina climate patterns to New Zealand. Improving our understanding of
our past climate from these ice core records, will put us in a better
position to plan for the consequences of future climate change such as
droughts, storms, floods, and water shortages in our hydro lakes.
This project is supported by the Foundation
for Research, Science and Technology through the GNS
Global Change through Time Programme, the Royal
Society of New Zealand through its teacher fellowship programme and
the Office of Global Programs, US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
(NOAA).
University of Maine
Paul Mayewski, Andrei Kurbatov, Sharon Sneed, Susan Kaspari, UMaine
Institute of Geological and Nuclear
Sciences Ltd, Wellington, New Zealand
Uwe Morgenstern, Julian Thomson
Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences
Shichang Kang and Xinsheng Gao
(and film crew from Stonehaven
Productions, Canada)
October 12, 2004 to November 15, 2004
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| Paul Mayewski |
Andrei Kurbatov |
Sharon Sneed |
Susan Kaspari |
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| Uwe Morgenstern | Julian Thomson | Shichang Kang |
Download a poster (1mb) presented at AMS8, to learn more about our initial results to determine how far back in time environmental records will go in the Southern Alps glacier ice of Mount Cook National Park, New Zealand.
Reference: Morgenstern, U., 2002, Dating of Southern Alps glacier ice, Mt. Cook National Park, New Zealand. 8th international AMS conference, Nagoya, Japan, 9-13 September.