Surface air temperature variations around the Antarctic Peninsula: Comparison of the West and East sides of the Peninsula

Abstract

This study investigated the spatial characteristics of warming trends and the dipole-like pattern of temperature field in the Antarctic Peninsula using surface air temperature (SAT) of 10 stations in the vicinity of the Antarctic Peninsula. SAT data for the 1962-2001 period at 6 stations (Rothera, Faraday/Vernadsky, Bellingshausen, Orcadas, Esperanza, Halley) revealed in general the larger warming trends in autumn and winter except for Halley. The largest warming was shown for August in the west side of the Peninsula (more than 0.9°C/decade). On the other hand, the recent 14-year SAT data showed the strong warming trends at 9 stations except for Halley in the earlier period (April-June) than August for the 1962-2001 period. The largest warming appeared in May at Esperanza and Butler Island. SAT of the two sides showed significant positive correlations over most of the period except for the mid- and the late 1970s, in which significant negative correlations were found. In the correlation analysis between SAT and sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies in the NINO 3.4 region, strong negative correlation was found in the west side of the Peninsula. Details of the correlation analysis exhibited that the negative correlation was significantly strong from the early 1980s to the mid-1990s. However, it was difficult to find significant correlations of ENSO with SAT in the east side of the Peninsula. So, in this study it failed to find out clearly the out-of-phase relationship of SAT across the Antarctic Peninsula.