A Simple Boom Assembly for the Shipboard Deployment of Air-Sea Interaction Instruments.

We have developed a simple boom for use in measuring meteorological variables from a ship. The main structural member of the boom, a triangular communications tower with rollers attached along its bottom side, is deployed horizontally from a long, flat deck, such as a helicopter deck, and will suppo...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Andreas,Edgar L, Rand,John H, Ackley,Stephen F
Other Authors: COLD REGIONS RESEARCH AND ENGINEERING LAB HANOVER NH
Format: Text
Language:English
Published: 1983
Subjects:
Online Access:http://www.dtic.mil/docs/citations/ADA134256
http://oai.dtic.mil/oai/oai?&verb=getRecord&metadataPrefix=html&identifier=ADA134256
Description
Summary:We have developed a simple boom for use in measuring meteorological variables from a ship. The main structural member of the boom, a triangular communications tower with rollers attached along its bottom side, is deployed horizontally from a long, flat deck, such as a helicopter deck, and will support a 100-kg payload at its outboard end. The boom is easy to deploy, requires minimal ship modifications, and provides ready access to the instruments mounted on it. And because it is designed for use with the ship crosswind, oceanographic work can go on at the same time as the air-sea interaction measurements. We describe our use of the boom on the Mikhail Somov during a cruise into the Antarctic sea ice and present some representative measurements made with instruments mounted on it. Theory, experiment, and our data all imply that instruments deployed windward from a rear helicopter deck can reach air undistrubed by the ship. Such an instrument site has clear advantages over the more customary mast, bow, or buoy locations. (Author)