Summary
In 1999 the Glaciology Program of the Australian Antarctic Division initiated a 5-year study of glaciological investigations into the interaction between the Amery Ice Shelf and the underlying ocean. The principle objectives of this project are: to quantify the characteristics and circulation of ocean water in the cavity beneath the Amery Ice Shelf; to determine the distribution and rates of basal melting and re-freezing processes beneath the shelf; and to establish how important ice melt beneath the shelf is to both the modification of circulating water masses and the total loss of ice draining from the Lambert basin. The AMISOR (Amery Ice Shelf Ocean Research) Project consists of integrated ground-based, ship-based, remote sensing and modelling components. This paper describes the construction and use of a hot water drill (HWD) for the production of access boreholes through the ice shelf at several locations. The drill was tested for the first time in Antarctica during the 1999-2000 summer field season, and successfully deployed in two subsequent seasons to produce ice shelf access boreholes to depths of 373 m (2000-01), and 479 m (2001-02) respectively, allowing direct measurements to be made in the ocean cavity beneath the shelf. Future holes are planned to provide further data suites at several sites around the northern section of the ice shelf to yield meridional and zonal variation of ice shelf-ocean processes and interactions.