Abstract:

The characteristics of the inland Antarctic ice sheet, including its roughness and hardness, are related to annual snowfall and wind speed, and these characteristics have important value as references for the study of the process of transportation. A new surface-monitoring method called the vehicle automatic monitoring system is proposed in this paper. The vibration amplitude of the sledge is taken to reflect the roughness of the surface, and the depth of the sledge rut, measured by laser ranging, is taken to reflect the thickness of the snow layer. The distance traveled by the vehicle is tracked via GPS . Through the data acquisition system, monitoring of the topographical features of the ice sheet can be realized. The proposed monitoring system was used during the 29th and 31st Antarctic expeditions undertaken in November 2012 and November 2014, respectively. Through analysis of the acquired data, the surface characteristics of the inland ice sheet and the thickness of the snow layer between Zhongshan and Kunlun stations were determined.

Key words: Antarctic ice sheet, characteristics of snow surface, sensors, roughness