Notes from the Field

The Pacific Ocean is the largest of these basins as well as the deepest. Its expanse runs 155 million square miles and contains "more than half of the free water on earth.” The CLIVAR P16S field campaign has entered the waters of the South Pacific knows as a subtropical gyre. Gyre means “circular or spiral motion.” In the ocean, wind generated surface currents travel in a circular direction, either clockwise or counterclockwise, forming a large, circular body of water. Blooms (large cell numbers) of phytoplankton cannot grow in these gyres because the water that piles up within the center of circulation is nutrient deficient.

By Ludovic Brucker We still wonder whether our campaign was successful, or fair. For sure, it was a mix of good and tough times. The pluses, making our campaign a good time: – We’re back from our field site, healthy and with all our fingers and toes! – We set up an almost perfect camp, […]

We have spent the last few weeks discussing the differences between inherent and apparent optical properties in the ocean and how we measure them. Now let’s take a moment to appreciate the information these data give us. I am sure many of you have seen satellite images of the ocean, hurricanes, etc. on the news and at other outlets. A lot of work goes into each and every one of those images and they can show remarkable things on a global scale that would be difficult to detect through fieldwork alone.

By Rick Forster Our team finally made it to the ice sheet on April 8, after being delayed for almost two weeks due a series of storms. That day, we awoke to patches of blue sky over the village of Tasiilaq and were eager to get to the heliport for our scheduled 11:40 AM flight […]

One of the greatest tools used by oceanographers today for measuring ocean processes is the CTD. CTD stands for Conductivity, Temperature and Depth. Conductivity is a measure of ocean salinity. The parameters collected and analyzed during CLIVAR campaigns includes, but is not limited to: salinity, oxygen, nutrients, chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC), total alkalinity, pH, dissolved organic carbon (DOC), helium, and tritium.

In spite of the rough weather, the FSG fellows have taken advantage of some calmer days to deploy a radiometer. A radiometer measures apparent optical properties or AOPs. AOPs describe how the light is entering and exiting the water column. Remember that sunlight contains a whole spectrum of colors that are determined by their wavelength. The character of the light that is reflected back out of the water can be different than what went in. More specifically, the wavelengths or colors that are reflected back out are the colors that were not absorbed or scattered forward.

By Clément Miège It might be hard to believe but yes, we are still in town! We have been delayed for a full week now, every day getting ready for a possible flight the next day, and every morning, we get the same message: “Unfortunately, there will be no flight to the ice cap today […]

By Ludovic Brucker  Kulusuk, 31 March 2014 — When I started writing this post, my opening was: Greetings from (still) white-out and windy Kulusuk 🙁 Updated opening sentence: Greetings from now rainy Kulusuk 🙁 🙁 The nice thing about weather forecasts is that they change all the time, so you never get bored watching them. […]

As many of you probably heard, there was an 8.2-magnitude earthquake off the coast of Northern Chile on Tuesday night. As with any earthquake around a coastal region or on the ocean floor, there is a concern about the formation of a tsunami. However, the wave height (the height from the base of the wave at the water line to the top of the wave) in the deep, open ocean is very small, maybe a few feet tall. As you can imagine, a boat or ship in the open ocean wouldn’t even notice such a tiny wave.

By Ludovic Brucker Kulusuk, 29 March 2014 — For our deployment to the field, we need two flights to bring our scientific equipment and camping gear. As mentioned in our previous post, we decided to avoid being on the ice sheet while the third storm system of the week affects the area. However, thanks to […]