40 MARION^ EXPEDITION TO DAVIS STRAIT AND BAFFIN BAY 



IMeiiiardus, by Breiinecke, by Wiese, and by Brooks and Quennell 

 with the object of determining what effect variations in these ice 

 areas have on the weather of Europe. Meinardus (1906, p. 151) 

 compiled a table giving the deviation and severity of the pack off 

 Iceland from 1801 to 1901. and since that time similar data have 

 been compiled monthly by the British Meteorological Office. The 

 basis of MeinardnsV figures were the number of days that ice was 

 sighted from the coast of Iceland — when the masses were particu- 

 larly heavy the values received double weight. The investigation 

 discloses a very clearly marked periodicity in the character of the 

 east Greenland pack of li/-^ years.-** The annual variations in the 

 ice off Iceland are associated with similar variations in the wind ; 

 for example, in a winter with unusually strong, fair winds more ice 

 than normal is to be expected to drift past Iceland. The data 

 selected by Meinardus to demonstrate this were the difference in 

 atmospheric pressure between Stykkisholm. Iceland; and Vardo, 

 Norway, which, if lai'ge, forecasts more ice than usual in the east 

 Greenland current the following spring. Wiese (1924, p. 289), in- 

 dependently investigating the variations in ice conditions in the 

 Barents and Kara Seas, found an exceptionally high correlation be- 

 tween autumn air temperatures there and the volume of pack ice 

 along east Greenland -li/o years later — a low temperature presages 

 much ice and vice versa. The well-marked periodicity of 4i/o years 

 is explicable when we realize that it represents the interval necessary 

 for the ice to com})lete the journey to Iceland from its sources. 

 Brooks and Quennell (1928, p. 3) have collected a long series of 

 statistical data on sea-ice conditions in the following regions : Off 

 Iceland; Greenland Sea; Barents Sea; Kara Sea; and Arctic Ocean. 

 The work of these meteorologists constitutes the most thorough inves- 

 tigation to date on the effect of northern ice on European weather. 

 More ice off Iceland, or in any one of these several seas than normal, 

 causes in the same months an excess of pressure around Iceland and 

 a deficiency of pressure from Paris to the Azores. One of the most 

 interesting discoveries was that heavy ice conditions during spring 

 in northern waters are liable to be followed by a deficiency of pres- 

 sure the following autumn around the British Isles. The cause is 

 in the liberation of more water than normal, by melting, to mix 

 with the Gulf stream during the summer. The regional variations 

 in sea temperature produce corresponding thermal variations in the 

 atmosphere bringing stormy weather to northern Europe. It seems 

 well established, therefore, from the foregoing that variations in 

 the pack ice of the northeastern North Atlantic exert an important 

 control over European weather, the effect of the ice on the atmos- 

 l^heric pressures for the countries north of the British Isles being 

 stronger even than that of the Gulf stream. 



The Eastekx Nokth Amekicax Pack 



One of the largest streams of ice that emerges out of the north 

 follows a path along the east side of Baffin Land, along the Labrador 

 coast, and eventually spreads out past Newfoundland. (See fig. 19, 

 p. 30.) The geographical positions of the North American lands and 



-"Brooks and Quennell (lOl'Si, p. 6,i recalculating make this flgure 4.76 years. 



