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Maker Buoy Variants for Water Level Monitoring and Tracking Drifting Objects in Remote Areas of Greenland

Meltwater runoff from the Greenland Ice Sheet changes water levels in glacial lakes and can lead to glacial lake outburst flooding (GLOF) events that threaten lives and property. Icebergs produced at Greenland’s marine terminating glaciers drift into Baffin Bay and the North Atlantic, where they can...

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Autores principales: Carlson, Daniel F., Pavalko, Wayne J., Petersen, Dorthe, Olsen, Martin, Hass, Andreas E.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2020
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7085713/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32106576
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/s20051254
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author Carlson, Daniel F.
Pavalko, Wayne J.
Petersen, Dorthe
Olsen, Martin
Hass, Andreas E.
author_facet Carlson, Daniel F.
Pavalko, Wayne J.
Petersen, Dorthe
Olsen, Martin
Hass, Andreas E.
author_sort Carlson, Daniel F.
collection PubMed
description Meltwater runoff from the Greenland Ice Sheet changes water levels in glacial lakes and can lead to glacial lake outburst flooding (GLOF) events that threaten lives and property. Icebergs produced at Greenland’s marine terminating glaciers drift into Baffin Bay and the North Atlantic, where they can threaten shipping and offshore installations. Thus, monitoring glacial lake water levels and the drift of icebergs can enhance safety and aid in the scientific studies of glacial hydrology and iceberg-ocean interactions. The Maker Buoy was originally designed as a low-cost and open source sensor to monitor surface ocean currents. The open source framework, low-cost components, rugged construction and affordable satellite data transmission capabilities make it easy to customize for environmental monitoring in remote areas and under harsh conditions. Here, we present two such Maker Buoy variants that were developed to monitor water level in an ice-infested glacial lake in southern Greenland and to track drifting icebergs and moorings in the Vaigat Strait (Northwest Greenland). We describe the construction of each design variant, methods to access data in the field without an internet connection, and deployments in Greenland in summer 2019. The successful deployments of each Maker Buoy variant suggest that they may also be useful in operational iceberg management strategies and in GLOF monitoring programs.
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spelling pubmed-70857132020-04-21 Maker Buoy Variants for Water Level Monitoring and Tracking Drifting Objects in Remote Areas of Greenland Carlson, Daniel F. Pavalko, Wayne J. Petersen, Dorthe Olsen, Martin Hass, Andreas E. Sensors (Basel) Article Meltwater runoff from the Greenland Ice Sheet changes water levels in glacial lakes and can lead to glacial lake outburst flooding (GLOF) events that threaten lives and property. Icebergs produced at Greenland’s marine terminating glaciers drift into Baffin Bay and the North Atlantic, where they can threaten shipping and offshore installations. Thus, monitoring glacial lake water levels and the drift of icebergs can enhance safety and aid in the scientific studies of glacial hydrology and iceberg-ocean interactions. The Maker Buoy was originally designed as a low-cost and open source sensor to monitor surface ocean currents. The open source framework, low-cost components, rugged construction and affordable satellite data transmission capabilities make it easy to customize for environmental monitoring in remote areas and under harsh conditions. Here, we present two such Maker Buoy variants that were developed to monitor water level in an ice-infested glacial lake in southern Greenland and to track drifting icebergs and moorings in the Vaigat Strait (Northwest Greenland). We describe the construction of each design variant, methods to access data in the field without an internet connection, and deployments in Greenland in summer 2019. The successful deployments of each Maker Buoy variant suggest that they may also be useful in operational iceberg management strategies and in GLOF monitoring programs. MDPI 2020-02-25 /pmc/articles/PMC7085713/ /pubmed/32106576 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/s20051254 Text en © 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Carlson, Daniel F.
Pavalko, Wayne J.
Petersen, Dorthe
Olsen, Martin
Hass, Andreas E.
Maker Buoy Variants for Water Level Monitoring and Tracking Drifting Objects in Remote Areas of Greenland
title Maker Buoy Variants for Water Level Monitoring and Tracking Drifting Objects in Remote Areas of Greenland
title_full Maker Buoy Variants for Water Level Monitoring and Tracking Drifting Objects in Remote Areas of Greenland
title_fullStr Maker Buoy Variants for Water Level Monitoring and Tracking Drifting Objects in Remote Areas of Greenland
title_full_unstemmed Maker Buoy Variants for Water Level Monitoring and Tracking Drifting Objects in Remote Areas of Greenland
title_short Maker Buoy Variants for Water Level Monitoring and Tracking Drifting Objects in Remote Areas of Greenland
title_sort maker buoy variants for water level monitoring and tracking drifting objects in remote areas of greenland
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7085713/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32106576
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/s20051254
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