Experimental Physical Oceanography


 


Hudson River Hartmut Peters
In May 2001, we returned to the Hudson River in the New York City area to explore the spatial variability of turbulent mixing. Working from the R/V "Lionel A. Walford" of the New Jersey Marine Sciences Consortium, we took sections with the "Shallow Water Microstructure Profiler" (SWAMP) and an ADCP mounted over the side. We focused on the vicinity of the George Washington Bridge where varying channel cross section and curvature appear to give rise to hydraulic control. The last 2 days of our operations were coordinated with a dye release experiment done by Bob Chant, Rocky Geyer and Bob Houghton (Rutgers, Woods Hole, Lamont, respectively). It appears to be the first time ever that turbulent mixing in an estuary was simultaneously observed through dye dispersion and microstructure measurements. For more detail see the cruise report. Scientific results are reported in Peters (2003). Funded by the Hudson River Foundation.

Suburban oceanography...
  ...working under the George Washington Bridge