Airborne Oceanographic Lidar results: SEEP II, Fluorosensing missions. Final report, 11 March--12 May 1988

Abstract

A series of 6 missions were flown with the NASA Airborne Oceanographic Lidar (AOL) in support of the Department of Energy (DOE) funded Shelf Edge Exchange Processes (SEEP) II investigations. SEEP II is the second major SEEP field study. The initial series of experiments, termed SEEP I, were conducted in the New York Bight in 1984. The SEEP II study site is located on the Atlantic Shelf east of the Delmarva Peninsula. SEEP II ship sampling and instrumented mooring activities began in February, 1988 and are scheduled to continue through the 1989 spring phytoplankton bloom. The results described in this report were obtained with the AOL on six flights arranged to span the annual spring phytoplankton bloom on the mid-Atlantic Shelf. The AOL field missions were designed to gather information on the surface layer distribution of the phytoplankton photopigments, chlorophyll and phycoerythrin, and sea surface temperature (SST) over a wide area surrounding the moorings. The flight lines were arranged to provide an assessment of these parameters from the shoreline across shelf and slope waters. On most of the missions, sampling was extended into the western edge of the Gulf Stream.