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In 1978, CZCS/Nimbus7, the first
Ocean Color space sensor, was launched by NASA. In 1981,
unprecedented observations of dinoflagellate blooms in the
Western English Channel were correlated with sea-truth
measurements (GREPMA in France, Plymouth institutes in
UK) but with no trace of coccolithophores. At that time, my research contract at Lille University was over and I got a one year stage at the European Center (JRC) in Ispra (Italy). Far from the 'front', I received in 1982 a letter from my French colleagues including this magnificent photo (figure 4) of Emiliania cells observed off Brittany on May 9, 1982 at 48° N, 7° 30' W. Unfortunately, there was no clear-sky CZCS image corresponding to this day. |
| Figure 4: cell diameter = 6
microns, discernible only with electron microscopy. Photo: Univ. Nantes, 1982. |
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| Figure 5: Raw Image, CZCS 29 May 1982. | Figure 6: After atmospheric corrections. |
A short while after, Patrick Holligan (MBA, Plymouth, UK) sent me the preliminary data of an oceanographic cruise at the edge of the continental shelf. Not only there was a 'clear-sky' CZCS during the cruise (1982, May 29 May, figure 5), but after atmospheric correction (figure 6), a correlation could be established between the CZCS reflectance values and the concentration of Emiliania cells, measured at the 19 stations of the MBA cruise. These results were published in Nature (28 July 1983).
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