ALBERT

Description: King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) is being built near Thuwal, Saudi Arabia with the goal of becoming a world-class, graduate-level research university. As a step toward this goal, KAUST has partnered with the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) to undertake various studies of the oceanography of the Red Sea in order to establish a research program in ocean sciences by the time the university opens its doors in the fall of 2009. Two of the KAUST-WHOI research projects involve deployment of surface moorings and associated instrumentation to measure physical properties of the Red Sea, such as temperature, salinity, and currents, at four locations off the coast of Saudi Arabia. The goal of these measurements is to better understand the evolution and dynamics of the circulation and air-sea interaction in the Red Sea. Two surface moorings and two bottom tripods (PI, Steven Lentz) were deployed at 50-55-m depth near 21°57'N, 38°46'E over the continental shelf close to the Saudi coast. An additional surface mooring/bottom tripod pair was deployed near 21°58'N, 38°50'E at the outer fringe of a reef system directly onshore of the shelf mooring/tripod pairs (PI, Lentz). The coastal moorings carry instruments to estimate temperature, salinity, and fluorescence; and the nearby bottom tripods support instruments to measure bottom pressure and the vertical profile of the currents. Additional instruments, principally bottom temperature sensors, were deployed over the reef system onshore of the shelf moorings. One air-sea interaction mooring (PI, J. Thomas Farrar) was deployed at 693-m depth near 22°10'N, 38°30'E. The air-sea interaction mooring carries instruments for measuring temperature, salinity, (water) velocity, winds, air temperature, humidity, barometric pressure, incident sunlight, infrared radiation, precipitation, and surface waves. A coastal meteorological tower was also installed on the KAUST campus in Thuwal (PI, Farrar). These measurements are of value because there are few time series of oceanographic and meteorological properties of the Red Sea that can be used to characterize the circulation, test numerical models of the Red Sea circulation, or formulate theoretical models of the physics of the Red Sea circulation. These measurements will permit a characterization of the Red Sea circulation with high temporal resolution at the mooring locations, and accurate in-situ estimates of the air-sea exchange of heat, freshwater, and momentum. In October 2008, a cruise was made aboard the R/V Oceanus to deploy the shelf and air-sea interaction moorings, and other fieldwork (e.g., tower instrumentation and deployment of reef instrumentation) was conducted after the cruise. Some additional data were collected during the cruise with shipboard instrumentation. This report documents the cruise and the data collected during the fall 2008 fieldwork.

Description: Funding for this report was provided by the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) under a cooperative research agreement with Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.

Description: An array of surface and subsurface moorings were deployed in the Arabian Sea to provide high quality time series of local forcing and upper ocean currents, temperature, and conductivity in order to investigate the dynamics of the ocean's response to the monsoonal forcing characteristic of the area. The moored array was deployed during R/V Thomas Thompson cruise number 40, One Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) surface mooring, two Scripps Institution of Oceanography (SIO) surface moorings and two University of Washington (UW) Profiling Current Meter moorings were deployed. The moorings were deployed for a period of one year beginning in October 1994 as part of the Office of Naval Research (ONR) funded Arabian Sea experiment. Two six month deployments were planned. The moorings were deployed at 15.5°N 61.5°E (WHOI), 15.7°N 61.3°E (SIO), 15.3°N 61.3°E (SIO), 15.7°N 61.7°E (UW), and 15.3°N 61.7°E (UW). The WHOI surface mooring was outfitted with two meteorological data collection systems. A Vector Averaging Wind Recorder (VAWR) and an IMET system made measurements of wind speed and direction, sea surface temperature, air temperature, short wave radiation, long wave radiation, barometric pressure, relative humidity and precipitation. Subsurface instrumentation included Vector Measuring Current Meters (VMCMs), Multi-Variable Moored Systems (MVMS), conductivity and temperature recorders and single point temperature recorders. Expendable bathythermograph (XBT) data and CTD data were collected while in transit to the site and between mooring locations. This report describes in a general manner the work that took place during R/V Thomas Thompson cruise number 40 which was the initial deployment cruise for this moored array. A detailed description of the WHOI surface mooring and its instrumentation is provided. Information about the XBT and CTD data collected during the cruise is also included.

Description: Funding was provided by the Office of Naval Research under Grant No. N00014-94-1-0161.

Description: Knowledge of the absolute wind velocity near the surface of the ocean is a requirement of the World Ocean Circulation Experiment (WOCE) and other large programs directed towards understanding air-sea interactions and how ocean circulation and climate are interrelated. The measurement is made possible using IMET (Improved METeorology) modules, a next generation meteorological data acquisition system developed as part of the WOCE program. An IMET system consists of a set of intelligent modules for each measurement variable, with data being recorded on a computer, typically PC-based. The IMET wind module includes a propeller for wind speed, a vane and optical encoder for wind direction, a flux gate compass for the north reference, and microprocessor-based electronics for control and data formatting. The IMET Global Positioning System (GPS) module includes a five chanel GPS receiver and microprocessor based electronics for control and data formatting. These modules, as part of the complete measurement suite, result in a self-contained system that can make accurate measurements from research ships, drifting and moored buoys, and volunteer observing ships (VOS).

Description: Funding was provided by Grant No. OCE-8709614 from the National Science Foundation.

Description: The authors have successfully designed, built and tested an aerosol sampler which is capable of collecting, in an unattended manner, a time-series set of aerosol samples (aerosol-embedded filters) from moored ocean buoys and remote areas on land. Research on aerosols, in particular, and atmospheric chemistry, in general, has not been previously attempted from buoys. Aerosols entering and leaving the ocean play an important role in climate change, ocean productivity, pollutant transport and atmospheric optics. This report discusses (1) the scientific applications of a buoy-mounted aerosol sampler, (2) the advantages of using buoys as research platforms and (3) the authors' new instrument. Also discussed are the results of a four month test of the aerosol sampler on the AEROCE (Atmosphere/Ocean Chemistry Experiment) tower in Bermuda and the results of a three month test on a buoy moored in Vineyard Sound off Woods Hole, MA USA. The direct comparison between WHOI filters and AEROCE filters from the Bermuda tower is very encouraging as the Fe concentrations of aerosols compare to within 10-15% over a wide range of values. Aerosol sampling from a buoy moored in coastal waters was successfully tested under a variety of atmospheric and oceanic conditions.

Description: Funding was provided by the National Science Foundation through Grant No. OCE-943212.