Water and energy fluxes in the lower Mackenzie valley, 1994/95

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Abstract
The 1994/95 water year in the lower Mackenzie Valley was an extraordinary year hydrologically, with the important winter to summer transition being the earliest on record. Unlike more temperate areas, the northern water year is dominated, to a great extent, by this onset of spring which results in the melting of nearly half of the annual precipitation over a period of a few weeks, initiates the thawing of the river and lake ice and the soil active layer, and marks the beginning of the evaporation season. An early winter to summer transition occurred at two small research basins in the Inuvik area and at the East Channel of the Mackenzie River Delta. At the research basins, for example, the spring of 1994/95 had the earliest onset of continuous above‐freezing air temperatures, removal of the snow cover, and initiation of runoff. Consideration of the entire water year at the research basins demonstrates that rain and snow were nearly equal in magnitude, evaporation exceeded runoff, and the annual change in storage was negative to near zero. This negative change in storage was related to the long, snow‐free evaporation season, above‐average air temperatures, and below‐normal precipitation. The unusual winter to summer transition on the Mackenzie River in the eastern portion of the Mackenzie Delta was, in many ways, even more remarkable than that in the research basins. Earlier work had suggested that the timing of the spring breakup was very consistent from year to year. An analysis of the timing of breakup from the early 1960s to the late 1990s, however, shows a trend towards earlier spring breakup, with the mean for the 1990s being nine days earlier than that for the 1960s, and with the 1995 breakup being the earliest on record. Such an early breakup is not only an indication of warm local conditions, but of warm temperatures and an early runoff event over the more southerly areas of the Mackenzie basin. A companion Mackenzie Global Energy and Water Cycle Experiment study illustrates the importance of a high pressure circulation pattern centred east of the basin to this early melt event.