ABSTRACT Since the 2000s, Greenland ice sheet mass loss has been accelerating, followed by increasing numbers of glacial earthquakes (GEs) at near-grounded glaciers. GEs are caused by calving of km-scale icebergs which capsize against the terminus. Seismic record inversion allows a reconstruction of the history of GE sources which captures capsize dynamics through iceberg-to-terminus contact. When compared with a catalog of contact forces from an iceberg capsize model, seismic force history accurately computes calving volumes while the earthquake magnitude fails to uniquely characterize iceberg size, giving errors up to 1 km 3 . Calving determined from GEs recorded ateight glaciers in 1993–2013 accounts for up to 21% of the associated discharge and 6% of the Greenland mass loss. The proportion of discharge attributed to capsizing calving may be underestimated by at least 10% as numerous events could not be identified by standard seismic detections (Olsen and Nettles, 2018). While calving production tends to stabilize in East Greenland, Western glaciers have released more and larger icebergs since 2010 and have become major contributors to Greenland dynamic discharge. Production of GEs and calving behavior are controlled by glacier geometry with bigger icebergs being produced when the terminus advances in deepening water. We illustrate how GEs can help in partitioning and monitoring Greenland mass loss and characterizing capsize dynamics.
Abstract Retreat of calving glaciers worldwide has contributed substantially to sea-level rise in recent decades. Mass loss by calving contributes significantly to the uncertainty of sea-level rise projections. At Bowdoin Glacier, Northwest Greenland, most calving occurs by a few large events resulting from kilometre-scale fractures forming parallel to the calving front. High-resolution terrestrial radar interferometry data of such an event reveal that crevasse opening is fastest at low tide and accelerates during the final 36 h before calving. Using the ice flow model Elmer/Ice, we identify the crevasse water level as a key driver of modelled opening rates. Sea water-level variations in the range of local tidal amplitude (1 m) can reproduce observed opening rate fluctuations, provided crevasse water level is at least 4 m above the low-tide sea level. The accelerated opening rates within the final 36 h before calving can be modelled by additional meltwater input into the crevasse, enhanced ice cliff undercutting by submarine melt, ice damage increase due to tidal cyclic fatigue, crevasse deepening or a combination of these processes. Our results highlight the influence of surface meltwater and tides on crevasse opening leading to major calving events at grounded tidewater glaciers such as Bowdoin.
Abstract Glacial hydraulic tremor (GHT) can be monitored to observe changes in location and distribution of water flow beneath glacial ice, allowing the spatiotemporal evolution of subglacial hydrology to be studied continuously and remotely. We use frequency-dependent polarization analysis (FDPA) to classify types of GHT and assess its spatio-temporal extent beneath Rhonegletscher, Switzerland, in a continuous seismic record through 2018 and 2019 at three ice-proximal bedrock-based seismometers. We determine the frequency bands composing the GHT and calculate back azimuth angles pointing to a previously known subglacial channel. We also inspect the relationship between GHT seismic power and water discharge from the glacier to compare daily and seasonal shifts with the observed GHT. We observed the seasonal shift from a distributed system to a channelized system, and our dataset allowed comparison of channel locations within and across seasons, with implications for sediment evacuation and bed erosion. The successful use of this method to assess GHT previously on Taku glacier (the methods of which this project follows) and now Rhonegletscher shows that existing ice-proximal passive seismic installations can be used to easily and continuously monitor subglacial hydraulic activity.
Abstract With mass loss from the Greenland ice sheet accelerating and spreading to higher latitudes, the quantification of mass discharge in the form of icebergs has recently received much scientific attention. Here we make use of very low-frequency (0.001–0.01 Hz) seismic data from three permanent broadband stations installed in the summers of 2009–10 in northwest Greenland in order to monitor local calving activity. At these frequencies, calving seismograms are dominated by a tilt signal produced by local ground flexure in response to fjord seiching generated by major iceberg calving events. A simple triggering algorithm is proposed to detect calving events from large calving fronts with potentially no user interaction. Our calving catalogue identifies spatial and temporal differences in calving activity between Jakobshavn Isbræ and glaciers in the Uummannaq district ∼200 km to the north. The Uummannaq glaciers show clear seasonal fluctuations in seiche-based calving detections as well as seiche amplitudes. In contrast, the detections at Jakobshavn Isbræ show little seasonal variation, which may be evidence for an ongoing transition to winter calving activity. The results offer further evidence that seismometers can provide efficient and inexpensive monitoring of calving fronts.
Abstract Records of Alpine microseismicity are a powerful tool to study landscape-shaping processes and warn against hazardous mass movements. Unfortunately, seismic sensor coverage in Alpine regions is typically insufficient. Here we show that distributed acoustic sensing (DAS) bridges critical observational gaps of seismogenic processes in Alpine terrain. Dynamic strain measurements in a 1 km long fiber optic cable on a glacier surface produce high-quality seismograms related to glacier flow and nearby rock falls. The nearly 500 cable channels precisely locate a series of glacier stick-slip events (within 20–40 m) and reveal seismic phases from which thickness and material properties of the glacier and its bed can be derived. As seismic measurements can be acquired with fiber optic cables that are easy to transport, install and couple to the ground, our study demonstrates the potential of DAS technology for seismic monitoring of glacier dynamics and natural hazards.
Improving our understanding of glacial sliding is crucial for constraining basal drag in ice dynamics models. We use icequakes, sudden releases of seismic energy as the ice slides over the bed, to provide geophysical observations that can be used to aid understanding of the physics of glacial sliding and constrain ice dynamics models. These icequakes are located at the bed of an alpine glacier in Switzerland and the Rutford Ice Stream, West Antarctica, two extremes of glacial settings and spatial scales. We investigate a number of possible icequake source mechanisms by performing full waveform inversions to constrain the fundamental physics and stress release during an icequake stick‐slip event. Results show that double‐couple mechanisms best describe the source for the events from both glacial settings and the icequakes originate at or very near the ice‐bed interface. We also present an exploratory method for attempting to measure the till shear modulus, if indirect reflected icequake radiation is observed. The results of this study increase our understanding of how icequakes are associated with basal drag while also providing the foundation for a method of remotely measuring bed shear strength.
Zusammenfassung Mit der Seismologie hat sich in wenigen Jahren eine wichtige Nische in der Messtechnik der Glaziologie aufgetan. Da mit Seismometern Prozesse überwacht werden können, die anderen Messmethoden weitgehend verborgen sind, sind sie nicht mehr aus modernen Feldversuchen wegzudenken. Ergebnisse haben gezeigt, dass das Gletschergleiten nicht nur ein gleichmäßiger und langsamer Prozess ist, sondern ähnlich wie bei Erdbeben auch ruckartig stattfindet. Beim Detektieren von Gletscherkalben bietet die Seismologie eine extrem hohe zeitliche Auflösung. Auch hydraulische Prozesse unter der Eisoberfläche können erstmalig nahezu in Echtzeit mitverfolgt werden. Weitere Erkenntnisse in der Gletscherseismologie werden somit zu unserem Verständnis in der Klimaforschung und über Naturgefahren, die von der Kryosphäre ausgehen, beitragen.
Abstract Glacier microseismicity is a promising tool to study glacier dynamics. However, physical processes connecting seismic signals and ice dynamics are not clearly understood at present. Particularly, the relationship between tide‐modulated seismicity and dynamics of calving glaciers remains elusive. Here we analyze records from an on‐ice seismometer placed 250 m from the calving front of Bowdoin Glacier, Greenland. Using high‐frequency glacier flow speed measurements, we show that the microseismic activity is related to strain rate variations. The seismic activity correlates with longitudinal stretching measured at the glacier surface. Both higher melt rates and falling tides accelerate glacier motion and increase longitudinal stretching. Long‐term microseismic monitoring could therefore provide insights on how a calving glacier's force balance and flow regime react to changes at the ice‐ocean interface.
Debris flows constitute a severe natural hazard and studies are performed to investigate triggering mechanisms and to identify and evaluate early warning systems. We present a seismoacoustic analysis of debris flow activity at Illgraben, Switzerland, with infrasound data collected with a small aperture array. Events are recorded as emergent signals of long duration, with seismic and infrasound amplitudes scaling with the flow discharge. The spectral content is stable and peaking at 8 Hz for the seismic and at 5 Hz for the infrasound that suggests two separate processes of elastic energy radiation, most likely bed‐load transport for the seismic and waves at the free surface for the infrasound. Although amplitude and frequency content of the infrasound signal are well within the processing limits, most of the signal is not showing any correlation among the array elements. We suggest that this is a consequence of the contribution of multiple sources of infrasound acting with variable amplitude and phase along the surface of the debris flow. At Illgraben, coherent infrasound is recorded only from fixed sources, corresponding to check dams within the channel. Here infrasound radiation is increased and the dams turn into predominant sources of energy. This allows to unambiguously identify the occurrence of debris flow at Illgraben with the infrasound array, from a remote and safe position and with a timing that is similar to the early warning system based on in‐channel sensors. This clearly shows how infrasound arrays could be used as an efficient early warning systems.
SUMMARY Distributed acoustic sensing (DAS) technology enables the detection of waves generated by seismic events, generally as uniaxial strain/strain rate time-series observed for dense, subsequent, portions of a Fibre Optic Cable (FOC). Despite the advantages in measurement density, data quality is often affected by uniaxial signal polarization, site effects and cable coupling, beyond the physical energy decay with distance. To better understand the relative importance of these factors for data inversion, we attempt a first modelling of noise patterns affecting DAS arrival times for a set of seismic events. The focus is on assessing the impact of noise statistics, together with the geometry of the problem, on epicentral location uncertainties. For this goal, we consider 15 ‘real-world’ cases of DAS arrays with different geometry, each associated with a seismic event of known location. We compute synthetic P-wave arrival times and contaminate them with four statistical distributions of the noise. We also estimate P-wave arrival times on real waveforms using a standard seismological picker. Eventually, these five data sets are inverted using a Markov chain Monte Carlo method, which offers the evaluation of the relative event location differences in terms of posterior probability density (PPD). Results highlight how cable geometry influences the shape, extent and directionality of the PPDs. However, synthetic tests demonstrate how noise assumptions on arrival times often have important effects on location uncertainties. Moreover, for half of the analysed case studies, the observed and synthetic locations are more similar when considering noise sources that are independent of the geometrical characteristics of the arrays. Thus, the results indicate that axial polarization, site conditions and cable coupling, beyond other intrinsic features (e.g. optical noise), are likely responsible for the complex distribution of DAS arrival times. Overall, the noise sensitivity of DAS suggests caution when applying geometry-only-based approaches for the a priori evaluation of novel monitoring systems.
