About Polar View Lake Ice Service

WHAT IS POLAR VIEW?

Polar View is an international program, offering integrated monitoring and forecasting services in the Polar Regions using satellite earth observation data to support improved decision-making, planning and adaptation to climate change. Polar View services include monitoring services of lake ice, river ice, and ice-edge; and enhanced sea ice information (charts and forecasts), snow maps and glacier and iceberg monitoring data. For more information, please visit the Polar View Portal

WHAT IS THE LAKE ICE SERVICE?

The Polar View Lake Ice Service (LIS) provides a Lake Ice Status service to the Nunavik Research Centre of Makivik Corporation and selected communities across the Nunavik region of Northern Quebec, Canada. This service is intended to support research activities and provide information about the state of key lakes in the region to the communities of Kangiqusualujjuaq and Kangirsuk. These lakes are important over-wintering habitats for Arctic char, an important source of food for the Inuit people of Northern Canada.

The LIS provides information on freeze-up, ice presence and ice break-up, supported by additional contextual information, such as weather and ice thickness. The LIS also features a comment log where community members can enter information about lake ice, travel to the lakes and hunting/fishing conditions.

HOW DOES THE LAKE ICE SERVICE WORK?

Earth Observation satellites capture images of the earth using RADAR technology. These images are downloaded from the satellite over Gatineau, Quebec and posted on an FTP server.
The satellite images are downloaded by technicians at Hatfield Consultants in West Vancouver, BC.
The images are processed using a set of automated routines to prepare them for interpretation.
An image analyst with experience in lake ice interpretation locates each lake within the satellite images and after consideration, assesses the lake status based on the following criteria:
- Lake Ice Presence
- Lake Ice Thickness
- Days frozen
The values from this assessment are recorded and entered into a database at Makivik Corporation using a web-connection.
These values are automatically updated in the LIS portal.

Service Delivery Chain

WHAT LAKES ARE INCLUDED IN THE LAKE ICE SERVICE?

The lakes currently included in the study are:

George River area:

Ijjurittuuq
Akilasaaluk
Tasikallak
Qaarlik
Uunartualuk
Koroc River Section
Payne River

Payne River

Tasirjuakuluk
Ammaluttuq
Tasivik
Quurngualuk (river narrow section)
Qilummijuq (river narrow section)
Quurnguapik (river narrow section)
Payne River sections 1, 2 and 3

Kangiqsualujjuaq

WHAT OTHER INFORMATION IS PROVIDED BY THE LAKE ICE SERVICE?

The Lake Ice Service portal integrates a number of information sources that will be useful to NRC and the communities of Nunavik. These data include:

Temperature and weather at the time of image capture from local weather stations.
Current and archived hourly temperatures
Other weather data - humidity, wind direction, wind gusts
Environment Canada 5-day weather forecasts

Arctic Char