Antarctic Wind Creates a Dramatic Humming Noise On The Ross Ice Shelf

[Judi Lynn]

"It's kind of like you're blowing a flute, constantly, on the ice shelf."

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By David Grossman
Oct 17, 2018

Because of its extremely remote location, most people only have a visual understanding of Antarctica. Today, the American Geophysical Union (AGU) offered a rare auditory experience of the southernmost continent: the sounds radiating off the Ross Ice Shelf.

Antarctica's largest ice shelf, the Ross Shelf is named after James Clark Ross, a British explorer famed for his expedition to the continent in the 19th century. Roughly the size of Texas or France, around 90 percent of its floating ice is underwater.

Under the Ross Shelf's snowy surface, scientists have buried 34 highly sensitive seismic sensors. In a press statement, AGU describes the snow "like a fur coat for the underlying ice, insulating the ice below from heating and even melting when temperatures rise."

As scientists were analyzing the data from the Ross fur coat, they noticed something they weren't expecting: a continual vibration. Winds powering through the tremendous snow dunes were letting off a sound of their own. Interestingly, when storms rearranged the snow on top of Ross, or when surface level temperatures changed, so did the hum.

More:
https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/environment/a23872231/ross-ice-shelf-wind-hum-noise/

[RGinNJ]

1. The Old Ones are stirring.

[lillypaddle]

2. eerie

the stuff of scifi movies.

[Mendocino]

3. The Ross Ice Shelf

is also under the influence of tides. Both Amundsen and Scott noted this in the early 1900's.