To investigate the current flow to the south of Madagsascar, which may contain contributions from the East Madagascar Current (EMC), eddies and a supposed 'retroflection'.
Flow regime around Madagascar: SEC - South Equatorial Current; EMC - East Madagascar Currennt; AC - Agulhas Current
The ship (RSS Discovery) set sail at 09:00 on Wed 26th Jan; the picture below shows her current position (red dot).
We aimed to sail along the blue track on the same day as the Jason altimeter followed that path: Feb 6th. Then on Feb 13 some crew had to disembark at Reunion Island (the island in the top right of the map below), after which we sailed again to the main campaign area.
To find out what we are doing on a daily basis, go to the
Cruise Diary
on oceans4schools.
This cruise will make use of
RRS Discovery,
one of the UK's main research vessels.
We will make use of satellite data, both in near real-time to direct the cruise, and in subsequent analysis to help put the shipborne measurements in context and develop a wider interpretation of the changing patterns of flow.
The above shows 4 short-period composites of ocean colour from seaWiFS, giving an indication that moving eddies might explain the 'retroflection-like' patterns seen by previous researchers.
During this cruise we will be making use of data from MODIS and MERIS.
Also we have maps of Sea Surface Height Anomaly courtesy of CLS/AVISO
To get a longer term picture than possible from a short cruuise, we will be deploying moorings to monitor the flow for 18-24 months. We will also be testing some novel timed release drifters, known as POD.
