and transport on a section across the North Atlantic Current

• Main Authors: Christopher S. Meinen, Olph Watts, R. Allyn Clarke
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: 1999
• Subjects: North Atlantic current; Absolute transport; Absolute velocity; Acoustic doppler current pro- "ler; ADCP; POGO transport #oat; CTD; Labrador Sea; north atlantic current; North Atlantic
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.586.4151; http://www.po.gso.uri.edu/dynamics/NAC/DSR_Meinen1.pdf

A transect of CTD pro"les crossing the North Atlantic Current (NAC) along WOCE line ACM6 near 42.53N during August 1}7, 1993, provides geostrophic shear velocity pro"les, which were absolutely referenced using simultaneous POGO transport #oat measurements and velocity measurements from a ship-mounted acoustic doppler current pro"ler (ADCP). The NAC absolute transport was 112$23]106 m3 s~1, which includes a portion of the transport of the Mann Eddy, a large permanent anticyclonic eddy commonly adjacent to the NAC. The NAC transport estimated relative to a level of no motion at the bottom would have under-estimated the true total absolute transport by 20%. A surprisingly large 58]106 m3 s~1 #owed southward just inshore of the NAC. This #ow, centered near 1500 dbars about 200 km o!shore of the shelf-break, was fairly barotropic with a peak velocity of greater than 20 cm s~1, and the water mass characteristics were of Labrador Sea Water. These absolute transport observations suggest southward recirculation inshore of the NAC at 42.53N and a stronger NAC than has