RV Oceanus OC432
Cruise summary report
| Cruise Info. | |
| Ship name (ship code) | RV Oceanus (32OC) |
| Cruise identifier | OC432 |
| Cruise period | 2006-10-19 — 2006-10-26 |
| Status | Completed |
| Port of departure | Woods Hole, United States |
| Port of return | Woods Hole, United States |
| Purpose | Research |
| Objectives | Background
This cruise constitutes one element of an ongoing observational program ― Line W ― funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation to investigate the characteristics and consequences of interannual variations in the Northwest Atlantic's deep western boundary current (DWBC). This study is documenting for an initial 4-year period, the temperature, salinity, tracer and velocity variations of the DWBC upstream of its Gulf Stream crossunder point. Line W includes a 5-mooring array of instruments situated in the DWBC flow regime on the continental slope south of Woods Hole and is augmented by twice-yearly occupations of a hydrographic section along this line. A companion research program by U.K. investigators is sampling bottom pressure variability at each of our mooring sites (and an additional site shoreward of the shallowest mooring) plus two additional lines crossing the DWBC to the east of Line W. The moored array, which consists of 3 McLane profilers and 2 moorings of current meters plus T/C sensors, is designed to quantify changes in DWBC water properties, stratification (potential vorticity) and transport. A sixth mooring of current meters, deployed in the mean axis of the Gulf Stream along Line W was added in spring 2005 (This mooring, named GUSTO-05, is maintained by Dr. M. McCartney and funded by WHOI's Ocean and Climate Change Institute.) Shipboard observations using CTD, LADCP and discrete sampling for salinity, oxygen, CFCs, SF6 and I129 measure the water column properties at high spatial resolution to help verify that the array resolves interannual signals. |
| Chief scientist | Ruth Curry (Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Department of Physical Oceanography) |
| Project | Line W |
| Coordinating body | WHOI |
| Cruise report |  (0.12 MB) |
| Ocean/sea areas | |
| General | North West Atlantic Ocean (limit 40W) |
| Specific | North West Atlantic Ocean between Woods Hole and Bermuda |
| Track charts | (0.12 MB) |
| Measurements | |
| Physical oceanography | |
| CTD stations | Quantity: number of profiles = 63 Description: CTD |
| Data held at BODC | |
| Discrete samples | |
| 21 CTD frame plus rosette sampler |
