Seafloor Temperature and Conductivity Data from Coastal Waters of the U.S. Beaufort Sea

摘要

Important and unique seabed engineering properties and conditions observed on the shallow shelf of the Beaufort Sea may be caused by low temperatures and variable salinities of bottom waters. A year-long monitoring program was initiated during the fall of 1985 to make daily measurements of these parameters using small, self-contained, low-cost instrumentation units placed on the seabed in four locations. The four sites selected were in areas where overconsolidated sediments, seasonal seabed freezing and shallow ice-bounded permafrost are known to occur. The instruments were recovered during the fall of 1986; three units contained useful data. The longest record was 341 days at station 8 in outer Harrison Bay. Seabed temperatures above 0 C, for the period of record, occurred only 15 days at one site and 13 days at another. The mean annual temperatures for these sites were-1.55 C and -1.60 C. Estimates of the onset of seabed freezing suggest that the seabed can freeze on all but 82 days of the year. Keywords: Continental shelves; Seasonal variations; Electrical conductivity; Alaska; Cold regions; Ocean temperatures; Sea ice; Seabed properties; Undersea temperature measurement instruments. (edc)