IMPACT OF SEA SURFACE TEMPERATURE DISTRIBUTION ON FREEZE-UP AND BREAKUP DATES ON RIVERS OF ASIAN RUSSIA

B. M. Ginzburg and M. I. Silnitskaya

To describe the spatial distribution of sea surface temperature (SST), the first coefficients of the expansion in empirical orthogonal functions of the SST anomaly fields in the North Atlantic and in the northwestern part of the Pacific have been used. Statistically significant relationships between SST and freeze-up dates in winter and SST and breakup dates in summer have been found for Siberian and Far East rivers. Zones where the use of predictors gives the best results in developing long-term ice forecasts methods have been identified.