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Lagrangian surface circulation in the Tyrrhenian Sea
Enrico Zambianchi, Pierpaolo Falco, Milena Menna, Pierre-Marie Poulain
Università Parthenope, Napoli
enrico.zambianchi@uniparthenope.it(Abstract received 04/30/2005 for session A)
ABSTRACT
The circulation in the Tyrrhenian Sea is still poorly understood. In particular, the southern sector of the basin is thought to be characterized by a basinwide cyclonic circulation, whereas the northern one by a seasonally modulated gyre induced by the wind, channelled through the Straits of Bonifacio which separate the two main islands bounding the basin on the west side, Sardinia and Corsica. Communication between the two subbasins would be ensured by the presence of two coastal currents, a northward one along the eastern boundary and a less well defined southward one along the western boundary. Starting in late 2001, some 50 CODE drifters have been released in the southern sector of the Tyrrhenian. Regular deployments have been carried out on the routes from Napoli to Palermo and from Napoli to Cagliari from research vessels and from ferries made available by the Italian shipping company Tirrenia. The very preliminary results of this experiment were presented at LAPCOD2 in 2002; in this update we show how the basin can be roughly divided into two subareas, characterized by different circulation features and regimes. The southern half of the Tyrrhenian Sea is dominated by a very high variability of the current field: the strong eddy activity makes it even difficult to identify a mean surface field. Most of the instruments deployed along the Napoli-Palermo route get trapped in the southeastern portion of the Tyrrhenian: this might lead to reconsider previous estimates of the residence time of surface waters in the basin. On the contrary, a northeastward current along the coast is visible north of the Gulf of Naples, and drifters caught in this stream rapidly reach the Corsica Channel and exit into the Ligurian Sea.
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2005 LAPCOD Meeting, Lerici, Italy, June 13-17, 2005