A moored array along the southern boundary of the Brazil Basin for the Deep Basin Experiment : report on a joint experiment 1991-1992

Abstract

The Deep Basin Experiment (DBE) is an international effort and a part of the World Ocean Circulation Experiment with the principal objective of improving our knowledge of the subthermocline circulation. The DBE fieldwork is focussed on the Brazil Basin and this report is concerned with a moored array situated along its southern boundary which was installed in early 1991 to measure the inflow and outflow to the Basin and to investigate the Brazil Current near 30S. This moored array was a joint undertaking by the Institut für Meereskunde of the University of Kiel and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. Moorings were deployed on Meteor Cruise 15, leg 1 and retrieved on Meteor cruise 22, legs 3 and 4. A total of 57 conventional current meters and two Acoustic Doppler Current Profilers were set on 13 moorings with some concentration within the Brazil Current and the Vema Channel. CTDs were taken at each mooring site as well as in between. Some of the recovered instruments were reset in the Hunter Channel, a suspected additional connection between the Argentine Basin and the Brazil Basin. A later report will summarize this data after it is recovered in May 1994.