The atmospheric rivers that make landfall in Antarctica create extreme atmospheric conditions that have a major influence on ice melt, snowfall and the stability of glacial plateaus. Over the past two years, a series of extreme events have highlighted their key role in Antarctic climate and surface mass balance, and offered the opportunity to develop collaborations, as after the exceptional heatwave of March 15-19, 2022 was made possible.

This collaboration took the form of annual workshops and the creation of the Antarctic Atmopsheric rivers Group (AARG). The aim of these workshops was to promote collaboration between different institutes and to analyze the current state of our research. Last year, in Boulder, Colorado, the AARG workshop led to the writing of a review paper on the state of knowledge on atmospheric rivers in Antarctica (under review). It now seems necessary to widen our field of action and see if other communities could offer complementary knowledge, new visions that could break down current blocking points. This is the case in the Arctic, where multi-disciplinary studies are being carried out by significantly different research communities.

The aim of this new workshop in Grenoble, from October 14 to 17, is to aggregate the current state of knowledge on Antarctica, but also to broaden our scope and propose wider discussions, for example on the Arctic. It's also about exploring the value of new multidisciplinary studies that could offer a new vision of atmospheric rivers. And to find time for a nice walk in the French Alps after the conference.

This will be a hybrid workshop with physical attendance on the Institut des Géosciences de l'Environnement (IGE) on the Université Grenoble Alpes campus. Details for remote attendance will be provided at a later date. If you have any questions on registration or anything else, feel free to email Vincent Favier at vincent.favier@univ-grenoble-alpes.fr and Victoire Buffet at victoire.buffet@univ-grenoble-alpes.fr

Abstract submission deadline: September 20

What are AR ?

To systematically ascribe particular characteristics to ARs, we need tools to detect and measure ARs. The detection and ranking techniques, which have been developed to characterize ARs specifically in Antarctica. However, are they specific events? If yes, what are they? Why are they so different, and how can we describe them more accurately? Further, would it be possible to capture the extreme nature and high temporal and spatial resolution with direct measurements by satellite or in the field?

This session aims to...

Antarctic AR physics

Through varying levels of spatial scales, Antarctic ARs have distinctive dynamical characteristics from their origin points to their eventual landfall. In this section, we present the typical AR life cycle through these spatial scales along with their characteristic cloud water (or aerosol) content and microphysics

This session aims to clarify the state of knowledge the AR Physics....state-of-the-art modeling results and observations that shed more light on the dynamics around atmospheric rivers.

AR Impacts and Extremes

ARs present circulation anomalies over the Southern Ocean along with significant impacts on surface variables over the Antarctic continent like precipitation, temperature, and melt. These impacts are destabilizing for Antarctica's vulnerable ice shelves and sea ice. This section aims to provide a comprehensive review of the critical influences of ARs on the ice sheet mass balance and local ecosystems, posing challenges in projecting climate change impacts in these regions.

This session aims to discuss the ...

Atmospheric river in the Arctic

There are plenty of studies elsewhere... what could they offer to us...