Title : Sea Spray and Icing in the Emerging Open Water of the Arctic Ocean

With the sea ice cover in the Arctic Ocean declining, the more extensive areas of open water will foster more frequent storms, higher winds, and bigger waves. These conditions can create copious amounts of sea spray. We anticipate that structures placed in shallow water—wind turbines, drilling rigs, or man-made production islands, for instance—will, therefore, experience more episodes of freezing spray that will create hazards for both personnel on these structures and for the structures themselves. The extra salt carried by the spray will also accelerate corrosion. Few observations, however, have been made of sea spray generation in high winds, above, say, 15–20 m/s; and no spray observations have been made in freezing temperatures. Our objective is, thus, to observe the size distribution and rate of creation of spray droplets at air temperatures below freezing and in winds above 15 m/s—and, preferably, above 20 m/s. Climatologically, Mt. Desert Rock, a small, well exposed island 24 miles into the Atlantic Ocean from Bar Harbor, Maine, provided just such conditions in January. Andreas and collaborator Kathy Jones thus spent most of January 2013 observing sea spray and measuring relevant meteorological and ocean conditions on Mt. Desert Rock. We are continuing our data analysis but did encounter frequent winds near 20 m/s and temperatures below freezing during our deployment.