Notes from Transect/Time Series, VOS, airborne sampling breakout session
23 September 2014, 2:15 – 3:30 pm
Group leaders: Ralph Keeling and Dave Munro
Participants: Rob Dunbar, Greg Mitchell, Sarah Gille, Cindy Nevison, Dale Kiefer,
Janet Sprintall
Notes from Dave Munro, edited by R. Keeling
One priority is to build on strengths of existing time series. There is an opportunity
to merge programs focused on physical/chemical observations with those focused
on ocean optical properties.
Research vessel transects
Drake Passage time series
Attributes
Critical "choke point" in ACC.
Proven value of time series from underway measurements.
Lateral gradients essential for evaluating lateral transports
Can resolve fronts, not seen well by floats
Allows measurement of variables not accessible from floats
pCO2 and dissolved gases
atmospheric gases
Lessons learned
-From XCTDs: hard closing heat budget except over 400m or more
-Advection terms are large in heat budget
-Same need will probably apply to O2/Nut/C budgets
Budget closing may require underway "toyo"-type system
Could work to 100m w/o slowing operation? MVP
Underway surface obs. still valuable for air-sea fluxes
Key questions going forward
How to sustain time series? A role for NASA and NOAA?
How to add additional key variables:
more chemistry (e.g. isotopes)
bio-optical variables
microphysics
forward-looking video archive (HIPPO had beautiful coverage)
RV Palmer from McMurdo to New Zealand (we did not really discuss)
Other frequent ship transits? (also not discussed)
Voluntary observing ships (VOS)
-Russian ships have underway seawater systems
-For four months a year these could function as science vessels
-Argentine, Chilean, Greek, Australia, New Zealand
-British ships – two research vessels (South Orkneys downstream of
Drake Passage, very productive)
-Falklands to South Georgia
-May be an opportunity for collaboration
-Shackleton and Endurance – two British research ships
-Univ. of Otago New Zealand is building a new research station
on Falklands
-Phil Boyd may be involved
Cruise Ships: ???
Yachts: -IOC has funded a program for float deployments from yachts
Paul Allen: – The Octopus – occasionally goes to Palmer Station
Naval ships - nothing promising
-What would one envision as a feasible science package for a cruise ship?
-Minimize and modularize optical/chemical/physical observing
systems that could be deployed first on the Gould and then on other
VOS
-Challenges are first clean water/good understanding of ship’s
specifics airflow around ship etc.
-e.g. there can be respiration in seawater lines which corrupts
underway observations
-There needs to be a scientist who is dedicated to the data that will
come from each VOS ship – for one, to help ensure data quality
-Barney Balch has a lab in a crate which he outfits on a ferry which
routes across the GOM. Also look at Emmanuel Boss’s system
-What optical measurements could be included?
-Fluorometers
-Chl a fluorescence
-Dissolved organic materials (CDOM)
-Downwelling and upwelling spectral irradiance
-Backscatter
-Focus is groundtruthing satellite measurements
-Could do variable fluorescence
-Hyperspectral variable fluorescence – ALF?
-Look up JGOFS and NASA optics protocols
-flow cytometer
-ADCP – other applications related to plankton
-Plankton recorders
-Zooplankton recorders
-Could be done with optics and imaging
-Dave Checkley already has an imaging instrument that
is automated and could serve as an example
LTER sites (We didn't discuss opportunities here much)
Palmer will soon have better access w/ new deepwater pier
New icebreaker (NSF?) driven by science questions focused on
winter and fall
Other water-side needs/opportunties
Need surface for microphysical measurements
-Scott Miller has worked on CO2 eddy covariance measurements from
the NBP
-What about underway measurements of surface roughness
-Could be done from the drone
Measurements from floats or drifters that relate to air-sea fluxes?
Atmospheric Measurements
Ground Stations for atmospheric gases
Current ground
Cape Grim
Palmer Station
South Pole
Baring Head, New Zealand
Potential for adding in situ obs of O2, N2O, etc.
TCON site at Waligon (sp?) - column averages of CO2, CH4.. but not O2
Needs and opportunities
Better colocation of obs of O2, Ar, CO2, N2O, CFCs
Improvements in N2O and Ar data
Value in adding in situ analyzers for higher resolution
Potential new ground stations
Macquarie Island (formerly used, discontinued)
Amsterdam Island (")
Kerguelen
Airborne gas measurements
Previous work:
HIPPO, Australian Tasmania profiling
Value proven for constraining fluxes (insensitivity to mixing)
Ongoing profiling: Nothing!
Key opportunities:
Using C130 flights to McMurdo - soon year round?
Chilean flights to ?? (King George Island, commercial
flight). Greg mentioned something)
Novel sampling platforms
UAVs, Global Hawk?, balloon (AirCore) - will need
instrument development, need profiling capability
Other unsorted thoughts
Key overarching questions: What are budgets for gross, net, export
production, ventilation over season. How are these varying year to year?
What are major drivers (iron, light, physical forcing, etc?).
We don’t have a lot of seasonal measurements
Focus on the seasonal cycle
Zonal transects are missing of most key variables.
Amundsen shelf undersampled. Of interest because rapid recent melting.
Koreans have begun traveling from Palmer to Ross Sea and sampling this
region
We need to know what happens in Pine Island Bay in winter but that may be
a topic for another scoping document
Also value in krill and while monitoring
Proto-typing krill monitoring systems for potential future use by fisheries, relevance
for permitting.
Meso-pelagic, opportunity for acoustic detector in Gould.