42 



MAEIOX EXPEDITION TO DAVIS STEAIT AXD BAFFUST BAY 



some 15,000 square miles disappeared through melting and diffusion 

 soon after it was cut off from its northern supply. The current and 

 temperature maps of Davis Strait compiled by the Marion expedi- 

 tion indicate a communication between Atlantic water from Cape 

 Farewell and water from Hudson Strait, and it is this mixing across 

 the main pathwa}^ of the polar current that interrupted the ice stream 

 sometime during May, 1928. The dissipation of ice by the active 

 discharge through Hudson Strait exerts a heretofore unsuspected 

 influence on the character of the east North American ice stream- 

 The increasing warmth of summer combined with the depletion of 

 supply are the underlying factors that prevent the march of arctic 

 ice from continuing past Xewfoundland throughout the year, but 



The East Coast of Eulesmere Land 



Figure 20. — One of the iciest of shores lies on the west side of Smith Sound. This 

 is a 12-mile-wide margin of the pack photographed on August 15, 1928. off the 

 east coast of Ellesmere Land just north of Cape Faraday. The pack is composed 

 of ice formed both locally and that brought here from farther north by the cold 

 current. Some summers the pack never uncovers the Ellesmere Land coast in the 

 Smith Sound region. (Photograpli by Commander B. Riis-Cartensen of the 

 Godthaab expedition.) 



an important accessory is the disruptive influence of Hudson Strait. 

 Were the Baffin Land-Labrador littoral not interru])ted, the amount 

 of pack ice carried into the western Atlantic would be much greater 

 than is actually the case. 



BAFFIN BAY PACK ICE 



Except for the traver.ses of occasional polar explorers our knowl- 

 edge of the ice of Baffin Bay has largely been derived from the logs 

 and records of the whalers. Pursued first by the Dutch, the industry 

 received added impetus after Ross's voyage, to reacli the height of its 

 prosperity in the middle of the last century. To-day little or no 

 whaling is done in Baffin Bay. According to the experience of the 



