ICE CONDITIONS USED AS A DESIGN BASIS FOR THE VOISEY'S BAY DEVELOPMENT

摘要

This paper reviews the range of nearshore ice conditions encountered along the winter shipping route serving the Voisey's Bay (VBNC) mine site in Labrador. The geographic scope focuses on the area beginning with the offshore approaches to Nain near 60° West Longitude, and ending at the dock site. Material draws primarily on the authors' experience with a series of studies in 1996 and 1997, and sections prepared for the VBNC Environmental Impact Statement (1997). The historic time scale of the ice review varies according to the source data, but generally ranges from 1972 through 1997. Accounts of the Moravian Mission (1795 to 1917) were used to construct an older record for comparison with modern data. The paper summarizes the following ice parameters: freeze-up and break-up trends, fast ice extent, spatial variability of ice and snow depth along the route and general pack ice characteristics.