Fig. 4: Time/depth distribution of hydrological properties under the Ross Ice Shelf.

Time evolution of the vertical profile of absolute salinity (a), conservative temperature (b) and Ocean Heat Content (OHC) (c) for float 6. White areas indicate missing data. The white polygon in the surface layer from 0 to about 200 m indicates the presence of the Ross Ice Shelf. The surface white rectangle in April 2022 is instead due to a gap in data collection. Each vertical black line in panels a–c indicates a float profile. Ice Shelf Water vertical plumes have been highlighted with red ovals in panel a. d Vertically integrated OHC for float 6. The numbers along the curves in panel d indicate the depth of the integration layer to obtain the OHC (see Methods).