The glaciers flowing into the Amundsen Sea Embayment, West Antarctica, have undergone acceleration and grounding line retreat over the past few decades that may yield an irreversible mass loss. Using a constellation of satellites, we detect the evolution of ice velocity, ice thinning, and grounding line retreat of Thwaites Glacier from 1992 to 2017. The results reveal a complex pattern of retreat and ice melt, with sectors retreating at 0.8 km/year and floating ice melting at 200 m/year, while others retreat at 0.3 km/year with ice melting 10 times slower. We interpret the results in terms of buoyancy/slope-driven seawater intrusion along preferential channels at tidal frequencies leading to more efficient melt in newly formed cavities. Such complexities in ice-ocean interaction are not currently represented in coupled ice sheet/ocean models.
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机译：在过去的几十年中，流入南极西部的阿蒙森海巢的冰川经历了加速和地线退缩，这可能导致不可逆转的质量损失。利用卫星群，我们检测了1992年至2017年Thwaites冰川的冰速，冰稀化和地线退缩的演变。结果揭示了退缩和冰融化的复杂模式，扇区退缩速度为0.8 km /年，浮冰以200 m /年的速度融化，而其他融冰以0.3 km /年的速度退缩，而冰融化的速度慢10倍。我们用浮力/坡度驱动的海水沿潮汐频率沿优先通道入侵海水来解释结果，从而导致新形成的空腔中更有效的融化。冰海相互作用的这种复杂性目前并未在冰盖/海洋耦合模型中体现出来。
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