The McLane moored profiler: an autonomous platform for oceanographic measurements

Morrison, A.T.; Billings, John D.; Doherty, Kenneth W.

doi:10.1109/oceans.2000.881284

Cited by 24 publications

(19 citation statements)

References 4 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…The cylindrical pressure case of the profiler unit ( Morrison et al 2000). ITPs are equipped with the SBE-41CP CTD sensor (manufactured by Sea-Bird Electronics, Inc.) mounted in the top hemispherical endcap on the cylindrical pressure case.…”

Section: Profilermentioning

confidence: 99%

Automated Ice-Tethered Profilers for Seawater Observations under Pack Ice in All Seasons

Krishfield

Toole

Proshutinsky

et al. 2008

Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology

216

226

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

An automated, easily deployed Ice-Tethered Profiler (ITP) instrument system, developed for deployment on perennial sea ice in the polar oceans to measure changes in upper ocean water properties in all seasons, is described, and representative data from prototype instruments are presented. The ITP instrument consists of three components: a surface subsystem that sits atop an ice floe; a weighted, plastic-jacketed wire-rope tether of arbitrary length (up to 800 m) suspended from the surface element; and an instrumented underwater unit that employs a traction drive to profile up and down the wire tether. ITPs profile the water column at a programmed sampling interval; after each profile, the underwater unit transfers two files holding oceanographic and engineering data to the surface unit using an inductive modem and from the surface instrument to a shore-based data server using an Iridium transmitter. The surface instrument also accumulates battery voltage readings, buoy temperature data, and locations from a GPS receiver at a specified interval (usually every hour) and transmits those data daily. Oceanographic and engineering data are processed, displayed, and made available in near-real time (available online at http://www.whoi.edu/ itp). Six ITPs were deployed in the Arctic Ocean between 2004 and 2006 in the Beaufort gyre with various programmed sampling schedules of two to six one-way traverses per day between 10-and 750-760-m depth, providing more than 5300 profiles in all seasons (as of July 2007). The acquired CTD profile data document interesting spatial variations in the major water masses of the Canada Basin, show the double-diffusive thermohaline staircase that lies above the warm, salty Atlantic layer, measure seasonal surface mixed layer deepening, and document several mesoscale eddies. Augmenting the systems already deployed and to replace expiring systems, an international array of more than one dozen ITPs will be deployed as part of the Arctic Observing Network during the International Polar Year (IPY) period (2007-08) holding promise for more valuable real-time upper ocean observations for operational needs, to support studies of ocean processes, and to facilitate numerical model initialization and validation.

show abstract

Section: Profilermentioning

confidence: 99%

Automated Ice-Tethered Profilers for Seawater Observations under Pack Ice in All Seasons

Krishfield

Toole

Proshutinsky

et al. 2008

Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology

216

226

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…For sampling in a fixed location, the moored profiler (Doherty et al 1999;Morrison et al 2000), which consists of a vehicle that repeatedly climbs a fixed wire using a wheel drive, has been very successful. The adaption of the profiler vehicle to climb a towed wire, however, is not a viable option for a ship-based towed system.…”

Section: Moored Profilersmentioning

confidence: 99%

Concept Tests for a New Wire Flying Vehicle Designed to Achieve High Horizontal Resolution Profiling in Deep Water

Roman

Hebert

2011

Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Efficiently profiling the water column to achieve both high vertical and horizontal resolution from a moving vessel in deep water is difficult. Current solutions, such as CTD tow-yos, moving vessel profilers, and undulating tow bodies, are limited by ship speed or water depth. As a consequence, it is difficult to obtain oceanographic sections with sufficient resolution to identify many relevant scales over the deeper sections of the water column. This paper presents a new concept for a profiling vehicle that slides up and down a towed wire in a controlled manner using the lift created by wing foils. The wings provide a novel low-power method of propulsion along the cable by using the free stream velocity of the wire moving through the water in similar fashion to a sailboat sailing up wind. Scale model tests show a wide range of achievable profiling glide slopes for tow cable angles between vertical and 458, and effective isolation of cable strum vibration from the towed vehicle body. The concept is not depth limited and will offer two-dimensional resolution that meets or exceeds current undulating tow bodies over the full water column. Additionally, this system could be used simultaneously with many other deep towed instrument packages to produce complementary datasets.

show abstract

“…The MMPs Toole et al, 1999;Morrison et al, 2000) were programmed to sample in bursts of four near-full-depth (one-way) profiles, with initiation of each profile in temperature, conductivity and pressure data are acquired at approximately 1.6 Hz using a low-power CTD and 3-axis velocity and geographic heading data are obtained at comparable rate by an acoustic-travel-time current meter. These raw data were reduced during post-processing to 2 db bin-averaged estimates of temperature, salinity and velocity.…”

Section: Observations and Analysis Proceduresmentioning

confidence: 99%

Near-inertial and thermal upper ocean response to atmospheric forcing in the North Atlantic Ocean

Silverthorne¹

2010

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Observational and modeling techniques are employed to investigate the thermal and inertial upper ocean response to wind and buoyancy forcing in the North Atlantic Ocean. First, the seasonal kinetic energy variability of near-inertial motions observed with a moored profiler is described. Observed wintertime enhancement and surface intensification of near-inertial kinetic energy support previous work suggesting that near-inertial motions are predominantly driven by surface forcing. The wind energy input into surface ocean near-inertial motions is estimated using the Price-WellerPinkel (PWP) one-dimensional mixed layer model. A localized depth-integrated model consisting of a wind forcing term and a dissipation parameterization is developed and shown to have skill capturing the seasonal cycle and order of magnitude of the near-inertial kinetic energy. Focusing in on wintertime storm passage, velocity and density records from drifting profiling floats (EM-APEX) and a meteorological spar buoy/tethered profiler system (ASIS/FILIS) deployed in the Gulf Stream in February 2007 as part of the CLIvar MOde water Dynamics Experiment (CLIMODE) were analyzed. Despite large surface heat loss during cold air outbreaks and the drifting nature of the instruments, changes in the upper ocean heat content were found in a mixed layer heat balance to be controlled primarily by the relative advection of temperature associated with the strong vertical shear of the Gulf Stream. Velocity records from the Gulf Stream exhibited energetic near-inertial oscillations with frequency that was shifted below the local resting inertial frequency. This depression of frequency was linked to the presence of the negative vorticity of the background horizontal current shear, implying the potential for near-inertial wave trapping in the Gulf Stream region through the mechanism described by Kunze and Sanford (1984). Three-dimensional PWP model simulations show evidence of near-inertial wave trapping in the Gulf Stream jet, and are used to quantify the resulting mixing and the effect on the stratification in the Eighteen Degree Water formation region.

show abstract

The McLane moored profiler: an autonomous platform for oceanographic measurements

Cited by 24 publications

References 4 publications

Automated Ice-Tethered Profilers for Seawater Observations under Pack Ice in All Seasons

Automated Ice-Tethered Profilers for Seawater Observations under Pack Ice in All Seasons

Concept Tests for a New Wire Flying Vehicle Designed to Achieve High Horizontal Resolution Profiling in Deep Water

Near-inertial and thermal upper ocean response to atmospheric forcing in the North Atlantic Ocean

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About