Award: OCE-2148276

This project funded the collection of oceanographic data by a Seaglider deployed on the Northeast US continental shelf and directed to the region just north of the Gulf Stream.Seagliders are underwater vehicles that change their buoyancy to move up and down through the water column as their wings allow them to move laterally through the ocean at the same time. They change their pitch and roll to navigate to weigh points that are dynamically selected by the science team in order to achieve a mission.The novelty of our data collection was that the underwater glider sampled for over 3 months in the same approximate location of two Saildrone vehicles, themselves continously collecting data of the lower atmosphere and surface ocean.Saildrones are wind-driven, heavily instrumented surface vehicles that are piloted by a shore-based team via satellite communications.While the underwater glider moves slowly (about 25 km per day) outside of strong currents, the Saildrones can travel at 2-8 knots (90-360 km per day) and are at the mercy of the winds.Finally, during the project, we gathered a research vessel (the R/V Endeavor, with research days funded by the Rhode Island Endeavor Program) with the glider and Saildrone vehicles to make high resolution vertical profiles in a transect from the New England shelf to just north of the Gulf Stream.Data from the glider is available to the public athttps://gandalf.gcoos.org/; Saildrone data has been uploaded to Global Telecommunications Systems, which is assimilated into weather prediction systems. A major outcome of this project was in understanding how to surmount the challenge of co-location of these different observing assets for data return that will ultimately enable us to develop a deeper understanding for air-sea interactions that impact weather and ocean uptake of heat and carbon. The development of early career scientists greatly benefited from this work.Four graduate students and one postdoc participated on the R/V Endeavor cruise when all observing assets were gathered in one location north of the Gulf Stream. A fifth graduate student deployed the glider in collaboration with the science crew servicing the OOI Pioneer Array. An undergraduate student, funded through the NSF SURFO program, spent the summer analyzing the data. With continued mentorship, we hope that these students will remain working in science and technology. Last Modified: 07/22/2024 Submitted by: JaimeBPalter