Physical characterization of air inclusions in river ice

The physical characteristics of air inclusions embedded in the ice covers of the Saint François River (Quebec, Canada) and the Athabasca River (Alberta, Canada) are studied because of the importance of such inclusions to the analysis and interpretation of Synthetic Aperture Radar satellite images used to characterize river ice. Studies of ice cores sampled from these two rivers show that the concentration of air inclusions in the ice cover is highly dependent on both the ice type as well as the rate of freezing. When this rate is slow, the ice cover will have few air inclusions. However, when it is rapid and sustained in duration, the amount and cross sectional diameter of these inclusions increase. Air inclusions in the snow ice were found to be spherical and ranging in size from just a few millimetres up to about a centimetre. Generally, air inclusions formed in the sampled columnar ice were sparse and either spherical or tubular in shape. Air inclusions in the frazil ice were found to present a different structure from those formed in the other ice types. In most cases, their shape were irregular and their distribution was inhomogeneous. The study of these inclusions under a microscope showed them to have angular boundaries with a whitish appearance. These results will be valuable to the development of radar backscatter analysis algorithms for river ice characterization.