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UCSB

Coastal Mixing and Optics (CMO)

Ocean Physics Laboratory

CMO Mooring Operations

We used a variety of newly developed oceanographic instruments to collect an extensive set of physical and bio-optical data. Instruments were placed on a mooring and a tripod at the CMO site to collect high resolution time-series of physical and bio-optical data at several depths. Four mooring deployments were conducted from July 8, 1996 through June 11, 1997. The tripod was deployed approximately 400 m southeast of the mooring in 70 m water depth from August 9, 1996 through June 11, 1997. Mooring and tripod turnarounds were approximately every 3 months. Our observational study was coordinated with studies by other CMO investigators to complement our measurements. The data obtained during the mooring and tripod deployments were compared to profile and discrete bottle sample data taken from ships at or near the CMO mooring site during the first and fourth deployments.

CMO site CMO Mooring
Left: CMO Site Map, Right:CMO Mooring Diagram

Subsurface Mooring and Bottom Tripod
We placed three bio-optical systems (BIOPS) on the subsurface mooring at approximately 12, 30, and 50 m depths, and one at about 2 meters above the bottom (mab) on the bottom tripod. BIOPS utilize the following instruments: 1) Biospherical Instruments, Inc. PAR sensors (QSP-200), 2) Biospherical Instruments, Inc. radiance sensors (MRP-200), 3) Sea Tech, Inc. stimulated fluorometers, 4) WET Labs, Inc. WETStar stimulated fluorometers, 5) Sea Tech, Inc. transmissometers, 6) Sea-Bird Electronics, Inc. temperature sensors (SBE-3), and 7) WET Labs, Inc. absorption and attenuation meters (ac-9). The sampling rate for the ac-9 was once per hour for 30 seconds and the sampling rate for all other sensors was eight times per hour.

We deployed physical instruments on the subsurface mooring during the remaining three deployments of the CMO experiment. Sea-Bird, Inc. SBE-16s temperature and conductivity sensors were placed at 15, 35, and 60 m. Temperature was also measured by TPODs and Onset Corp. Tidbit temperature sensors at 10, 11, 20, 25, 30, 40, 45, 50, 55, and 65 m. We also deployed an uplooking ADCP at 65 m for currents binned every 2 m. These instruments sampled 16 times per hour, except the Tidbit temperature sensors, which sampled every 24 minutes.


Left: Chuck Pottsmith (Sequoia Scientific), Right: Joe McNeil,
both at the test tripod deployment in Seattle, Washington, June 1996


Professor Tommy Dickey monitoring a BIOPS package during the first mooring deployment, July 1996


Three of our BIOPS packages