Fine-scale observations across the Atlantic Ocean

– Dante Napolitano,PostDoc, LOPS – 

Résumé :

High-quality, small-scale observations are rare due to their often prohibitive costs of acquisition and the intermittent nature of the processes and features themselves. In this talk, I will share part of my work as a postdoc of the Laboratoire d’Océanographie Physique et Spatiale (LOPS), where I had the privilege to work with unprecedented fine-scale observations. First, I will show results from the Eurec4a campaign in the Tropical Atlantic, during which an array of robotic sailboats, called Saildrones, sailed in formation to measure two-dimensional small-scale gradients in the Amazon Plume region. Then, we move to the Subpolar-Subtropical North Atlantic Transition Zone, where, during the CROSSROAD-2 campaign, we obtained combined CTD-LADCP measurements operating in « tow-yo » mode. This consists of many hours of continuos sampling to capture submesoscale dynamics associated with bottom currents interacting with the continental slope topography. Finally, I will address the current state and perspectives for the reuse of refurbished Argo floats to sample submesoscales.