Abstract:

GoMix is a three-year project with the goal of understanding the mechanisms, spatial inhomogeneity, and temporal intermittency of boundary mixing along the Northern Deepwater Gulf. There are several platforms. This data set concerns measurements obtained with two short moorings of ~75 m height, deployed at (28.4147°N, 89.2298°W), in about 600 m of water and at (28.2776°N, 89.2604°W) in about 825 m of water. These moorings were both equipped with a downward-looking, high-frequency ADCP and high precision temperature sensors. The deeper mooring, deployed for a shorter duration, was additionally equipped with an enhanced Modular Acoustic Velocity Sensor (MAVS) designed for direct estimates of turbulent temperature flux.

Suggested Citation:

Polzin, Kurt; DiMarco, Steven F.; Wang, Zhankun; Wang, Binbin. 2020. GoMix I mooring data, northern Gulf of Mexico, 2016-09-18 to 2017-08-18. Distributed by: Gulf of Mexico Research Initiative Information and Data Cooperative (GRIIDC), Harte Research Institute, Texas A&M University–Corpus Christi. doi:10.7266/n7-8avq-ar61

Publications:

Polzin, K. L., Wang, B., Wang, Z., Thwaites, F., & Williams, A. J. (2021). Moored Flux and Dissipation Estimates from the Northern Deepwater Gulf of Mexico. Fluids, 6(7), 237. doi:10.3390/fluids6070237

Purpose:

To measure the dynamics of ocean current and internal structure of mixing.

Data Parameters and Units:

The shallow mooring SBE-39 files contain a text header followed by data having the format temperature [degrees C], Date [DD Mon 2016], and time [HH:MM:SS]. The deep mooring SBE-39 files contain a text header followed by data of the format temperature [degrees C], Date [decimal Julian yearday], and flag. The MAVS directory contains two Matlab files. MAVS_RSKTemp.mat contains a structure specifying configuration settings, as well as the data (time [Matlab format], temperature [degrees C]). GoMIX_2016_Deep.mat contains the arrays Year, Month, Day, Hour, Minute, Second, U (along-current velocity component, [m/s]), V (cross-current velocity component, [m/s]), and V (upward velocity component, [m/s]). The RDCP directories contain both raw and ascii-format data. The ascii file has the format Record Interval, Time Tag (GMT) [DD.MM.YYYY HH:MM], Temperature [degrees C], Conductivity [mS/cm, Pressure [kPa], Pitch [degrees], Roll [degrees], Heading [degrees] , Salinity, SoundSpeed [m/s], BatteryVoltage [V], PingCount, PulseAttenuation, North/East/Z velocity triplets for depths from 4m to 82m in 2m bins [m/s]; Speed Beam1, Speed Beam2, SpeedBeam3, and SpeedBeam4 for depths from 4m to 82 m in 2m bins [m/s]; SignalStrength for depths from 4m to 82m in 2m bins; StdDev from 4m to 82m in 2m bins [m/s]. RDCP: The cell size is 2 m with 50% overlap.

Methods:

Velocity data were measured using a down-looking RDCP to measure boundary layer flows. The temperature was recorded using SBE-39s temperature data logger at various depths (shallow mooring 77.5 meters above the bottom (mab), 56.5 mab, 41 mab, 22.5 mab, 7.5 mab; deep mooring 59 mab, 45 mab, 31 mab, 13.5 mab, 7 mab). A MAVS was used to measure high-frequency velocity variations on the deep mooring, approximately 10 mab. An RBR temperature data logger was used to measure high-frequency temperature.

Instruments:

Aandera RDCP (shallow mooring 75 mab; deep mooring 72 mab, Seabird SBE-39, MAVS, RBR temperature data logger.

Error Analysis:

The RDCP data contain suspect readings, denoted by a ‘{3}’ after the reading; they are often associated with weak signal strength. These readings should be flagged as bad, and the entire observation at that time treated carefully.

Individual Files: