# Presentation: 077621

**THE SOUTH EAST EXTENSION OF THE PILOT MOORED ARRAY IN THE TROPICAL ATLANTIC **
** ****PIRATA SEE **
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- EGEE 3 cruise track in June 2006

- Courtesy IRD web site

## Slide 3

## PIRATA IS THE PILOT MOORED ARRAY IN THE TROPICAL ATLANTIC 

**PIRATA IS THE PILOT MOORED ARRAY IN THE TROPICAL ATLANTIC **

**Status of the PIRATA array of Atlas Mooring. Original array (red), South West extension (Brazil), South East extension (purple) and Northeast extension (blue) (Courtesey IRD web site)**

## STATUS OF THE SOUTH EAST EXTENSION OF THE PILOT MOORED ARRAY IN THE TROPICAL ATLANTIC ( PIRATA SEE )                                          An ACTION COMMITTEE was set up to promote the extension and a resolution was drawn at the SAMS 2000 Symposium in November 1999.PIRATA SEE ACTION COMMITTEE: Geoff Bailey: Marine and Coastal Management BENEFIT. Geoff Brundrit: Oceanography DPT, UCT, GOOS Quilanda Fidel: Angola, BENEFIT Chris Reason: UCT. CLIVAR. Mathieu Rouault. PIRATA SEE chairman. UCT Mark Majodina: South African Weather Service. Carl Wainman: Institute of Marine and Technology. 

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**PIRATA SE extension general scientific objectives are: **
** **
**To monitor the surface and upper-ocean thermal structure at key locations.**
** **
**To help in determining the relationship between regional impacts of climate variations on agriculture and Fisheries. **
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**To complete the existing and future status of the observing system in the Tropical Atlantic **
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**To validate regional or global ocean, atmosphere and coupled models **
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**To serve as input to model assimilation systems **
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**To serve as ground truth for satellite missions and to the development of blended satellite-in situ**
**analyses. **
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**To gain new insights into ocean-atmosphere interaction **
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**To improve the description of air-sea fluxes of momentum, heat, and moisture. **
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**To improve the description of temperature and salinity in the ocean and study the effect of the coupling between heat and salt balances. **
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**To help characterise seasonal and interannual variation in surface moisture fluxes**
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**To better understand the mechanisms governing SST variability. **

**1999-2002:  20 PIRATA SEE RELATED TALKS DELIVERED IN NAMIBIA, SOUTH AFRICA AND FRANCE****NUMEROUS PARTICIPATIONS TO PIRATA OR CLIVAR MEETINGS  ****A FEASABILITY STUDY WAS CONDUCTED IN 2003 AND WAS SPONSORED BY THE BENGUELA CURRENT  LARGE MARINE ECOSYSTEM.****PARTICIPATION TO A PIRATA CRUISE (DAKAR TO LOME) in 2002**
**A WHITE PAPER WAS SENT TO PIRATA  FOR CHECKING THE ADEQUACY OF THE EXTENSION. ****FEASABILITY STUDY DOCUMENT SENT TO BCLME IN DECEMBER 2003.**

**December 2004 Demonstration project endorsed by PIRATA at one location (around 8 E 5 S). **
**IRD to deploy and recover the mooring**
**September 2005:  pre-proposal requested by BCLME**
**Mooring + curentmeter 85 000 $**
**Transport                       5 000 $**
**Project coordination, workshops  10 000 $**
**In kind from IRD(cruise EGEE)estimated at 500 000 $**
**Proposal submitted at the end of October 2005**
**Decision made at the end of November 2005**
**Mooring shipped to Africa in February 2006**

**WHY**
**WARM OCEANIC EVENTS OFF ANGOLA ARE LINKED TO FLOODS IN COASTAL ANGOLA**
**WHEN LOW OXYGEN NUTRIENT POOR WARM WATER PENETRATES IN THE UPWELLING SYSTEM OF THE BENGUELA ANGOLA SYSTEM THEY HAVE A NEGATIVE IMPACT ON FISHERIES**
**WARM AND COLD EVENTS ARE LINKED TO EQUATORIAL DYNAMICS.**
**MECHANISMS ARE NOT WELL KNOWN (advection, wave dynamics, wind curl, latent heat flux, radiative budget)**

## troubleshooting

- Extra T and S probe at 10 m failed
- Radiation failed

**PIRATA  SEE Southern African contribution to**
**GOOS**
**BCLME**
**Guinee LME**
**AMMA**
**TACE**
**CLIVAR**
**GLOBEC**

**First results presented:**
**2 talks (SANCOR, SASAS) in September and October 2006**
**October 2006 GLOBEC Newsletter**

## What next

- Find 85 000 $ to replace the mooring in 2006 before February 2007
- Project evaluation at the end of June 2007.
-  May/June 2007 EGEE cruise