web site: http://uop.whoi.edu/stratus/
A mooring deployed at 20° S, 85° W, under the stratus cloud deck off of Chile, has now returned two years of coincident upper ocean temperature, salinity and velocity, as well as a full suite of surface fluxes. One of the first goals of this analysis is to understand the development of the surface mixed layer and consequently the evolution of sea surface temperature (SST). A local 1-D heat budget shows that advection of cold water from the SouthEast must be important in maintaining the observed SSTs. Salinity is also not well reproduced but in this case the solution is not lateral advection, but vertical diffusion, probably enhanced by salt fingering through the strong halocline between the base of the winter mixed layer and the deeper salinity minimum.
The data also shows substantial shear between the currents at 130m (near the base of the deep winter mixed layer) and a deep current meter at 450m. These velocity signals may indicate substantial mesoscale eddy activity.