SNOWPACK simulations for Thwaites Cavity and Channel AMIGOS sites in West Antarctica

Compressed zip file, containing the SNOWPACK model simulations used in the manuscript: Maclennan, M. L., Lenaerts, J. T. M., Shields, C. A., Hoffman, A. O., Wever, N., Thompson-Munson, M., Winters, A. C., Pettit, E. C., Scambos, T. A., and Wille, J. D.: Climatology and Surface Impacts of Atmospheric Rivers on West Antarctica, The Cryosphere Discuss. [preprint], https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-2022-101, in review, 2022.

MeteoIO and SNOWPACK are software published under the GNU LGPLv3 license by the WSL Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research SLF, Davos, Switzerland at https://gitlabext.wsl.ch/snow-models. The repository used to develop the versions of MeteoIO and SNOWPACK used in this study can be accessed at https://github.com/snowpack-model/snowpack (doi: 10.5281/zenodo.3891845) with the exact version corresponding to commit 149c586 (doi: 10.5281/zenodo.7331794).

The workflow consists of two phases. First, using MERRA-2 reanalysis as forcing, a spinup is performed for the MERRA-2 grid point closest to the AMIGOS weather stations Channel (CHA) and Cavity (CAV).

To perform the spinup:

navigate to the ./simulations_spinup/ directory

edit the following line in the file spinup.rc, to modify the path where the time_shift_script can be found: time_shift_script="/path/to/snowpack/Source/snowpack/tools/timeshift_sno_files.sh" This script can be found in the SNOWPACK repository.

Execute the two SNOWPACK spinup simulations specified below. Change the path to point to the SNOWPACK binary executable. The simulations are performed for the two sites, which use the same meteorological forcing, but have a different end date specified for the simulation (corresponding to the installation date of the AMIGOS weather station):

bash spinup.sh "/path/to/usr/bin/snowpack -c cfgfiles/THWAITES_CAV.ini -e 2020-01-10T01:00 > log/THWAITES_SPINUP.log 2>&1" startover=1
bash spinup.sh "/path/to/usr/bin/snowpack -c cfgfiles/THWAITES_CHA.ini -e 2020-01-16T01:00 > log/THWAITES_SPINUP.log 2>&1" startover=1

Brief overview of the files in the simulations_spinup directory:

base.ini: SNOWPACK settings shared by all simulations

spinup.ini: Specific settings used when the spinups are being performed

final.ini: Specific settings used when the final simulation is being performed, after the spinup has completed

spinup.rc: Specific spinup settings imported by the spinup.sh script

spinup.sh: bash script to perform spinups

cfgfiles/THWAITES_CAV.ini: Specific model settings for the Cavity site. This *.ini file is specified to SNOWPACK, and it directs to include other *ini files.

cfgfiles/THWAITES_CHA.ini: Specific model settings for the Channel site. This *.ini file is specified to SNOWPACK, and it directs to include other *ini files.

current_snow/THWAITES.sno: *.sno file used for the restarts within the spinup procedure

log: directory to store simulation logs. Note that in the commands above, we redirect stdout and stderr to files in this directory

output: directory to store model outputs. See SNOWPACK documentation for more details. *.smet and *.pro files can be visualized using NiViz

smet: directory to store the meteorological forcing data for the simulations

snow_init/THWAITES.sno: initial *.sno files used to start the spinup

To perform the final simulations, covering the atmospheric river period:

navigate to the ./simulations_final/ directory

execute a snowpack simulation for each *.ini file in the cfgfiles directory:

for f in cfgfiles/*ini
do
/path/to/usr/bin/snowpack -c ${f} -e NOW
done

The following simulations will be performed:

cfgfiles/*ini file:
Label output files
Mode
AMIGOS AWS
Parameters from AMIGOS AWS
Reanalysis
Parameters from reanalysis

THWAITES_CAV_ERA5.ini
THWAITES_ERA5_HSDRIVEN_CAV_ERA5
Snow height driven
Cavity
TA RH VW HS
ERA5
ILWR ISWR

THWAITES_CAVHS_ERA5.ini
THWAITES_ERA5_HSDRIVEN_CAVHS_ERA5
Snow height driven
Cavity
HS
ERA5
TA RH VW ILWR ISWR

THWAITES_CHA_ERA5.ini
THWAITES_ERA5_HSDRIVEN_CHA_ERA5
Snow height driven
Channel
TA RH VW HS
ERA5
ILWR ISWR

THWAITES_CHAHS_ERA5.ini
THWAITES_ERA5_HSDRIVEN_CHAHS_ERA5
Snow height driven
Channel
HS
ERA5
TA RH VW ILWR ISWR

THWAITES_REFCAV_ERA5.ini
THWAITES_ERA5_PSUM_CAV_ERA5
Precipitation driven 
Cavity

ERA5
PSUM TA RH VW ILWR ISWR

THWAITES_REFCHA_ERA5.ini
THWAITES_ERA5_PSUM_CHA_ERA5
Precipitation driven 
Channel

ERA5
PSUM TA RH VW ILWR ISWR

THWAITES_CAV_MERRA2.ini
THWAITES_MERRA2_HSDRIVEN_CAV_MERRA2
Snow height driven
Cavity
TA RH VW HS
MERRA-2
ILWR ISWR

THWAITES_CAVHS_MERRA2.ini
THWAITES_MERRA2_HSDRIVEN_CAVHS_MERRA2
Snow height driven
Cavity
HS
MERRA-2
TA RH VW ILWR ISWR

THWAITES_CHA_MERRA2.ini
THWAITES_MERRA2_HSDRIVEN_CHA_MERRA2
Snow height driven
Channel
TA RH VW HS
MERRA-2
ILWR ISWR

THWAITES_CHAHS_MERRA2.ini
THWAITES_MERRA2_HSDRIVEN_CHAHS_MERRA2
Snow height driven
Channel
HS
MERRA-2
TA RH VW ILWR ISWR

THWAITES_REFCHA_MERRA2.ini
THWAITES_MERRA2_PSUM_CAV_MERRA2
Precipitation driven 
Cavity

MERRA-2
PSUM TA RH VW ILWR ISWR

THWAITES_REFCAV_MERRA2.ini
THWAITES_MERRA2_PSUM_CHA_MERRA2
Precipitation driven 
Channel

MERRA-2
PSUM TA RH VW ILWR ISWR

Brief overview of the files in the simulations_final directory:

base.ini: SNOWPACK settings shared by all simulations (identical to base.ini in simulations_spinup directory

cfgfiles: Specific model settings for each simulation as listed in the table above.

current_snow: The initial *.sno file containing the initial firn conditions

final.ini: Settings used by all simulations in this directory

output: directory to store model outputs. See SNOWPACK documentation for more details. *.smet and *.pro files can be visualized using NiViz

prepare_snowpack.sh: bash script setting up the final simulations after the simulations in simulations_spinup completed. Among others, the code to mark the installation reference layers for the snow depth measurements is included in this script.

smet: ERA5 and MERRA-2 forcing data, as well as snow height for Cavity and Channel (cavity_hs.smet and channel_hs.smet, respectively) as well as the other meteorological parameters (cavity_meteo.smet and channel_meteo.smet, respectively).

Note:
Please refer to doi: 10.15784/601552 and doi: 10.15784/601549 for the AMIGOS weather station data