HR: 0830h
AN: OS11A-19    [Abstracts]
TI: Intermediate-Depth Currents Estimated From Float Measurements in the Gulf of Mexico
AU: * Weatherly, G L
EM: weatherly@ocean.fsu.edu
AF: Georges Weatherly Nicolas Wienders, Dept. of Oceanography Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL 32306-4320 United States
AU: Wienders, N
EM: wienders@ocean.fsu.edu
AF: Georges Weatherly Nicolas Wienders, Dept. of Oceanography Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL 32306-4320 United States
AU: Romano, A
EM: ae2235@columbia.edu
AF: Anastasia Romanou, Department of Applied Physics and Applied Mathematics Columbia University, New York, NY 10025 United States
AB: Data from 17 PALACE floats set in the Gulf of Mexico sampling the intermediate-depth (~ 900 db) flow from April 1998 to February 2002 indicate a mean cyclonic circulation along the northern, western and southwestern edges of the Gulf of Mexico. This flow intensified into a ~ 0.10 m/s current in the western and southern Bay of Campeche and was deflected around a topographic feature, called here the Campeche Bay Bump, in the southern Bay of Campeche. Associated with this intensified flow was a small cyclonic gyre in the southwestern Bay of Campeche. Floats launched in the eastern Gulf of Mexico tended to stay there and those launched in the western Gulf of Mexico tended to stay in the western Gulf of Mexico suggesting restricted connection at depth between the eastern and western Gulf of Mexico. The current estimates made neglecting non-900 db depth drifts before first-surface fix and drifts after last-surface fix were 10% larger than those which took into account these drifts. Most of this (8%) was due to neglect of the surface drift before first and after last fix. Except for stronger flow below the Loop Current and Loop Current warm-core rings, no other pattern was seen between the intermediate depth flow and the surface flow.
DE: 4223 Descriptive and regional oceanography
DE: 4243 Marginal and semienclosed seas
DE: 4512 Currents
SC: Ocean Sciences [OS]
MN: 2005 Joint Assembly