PCM5 (ASUKA)

This experiment produced 40 current meter records from 9 moorings, each of which was occupied twice. You can view metadata and download the records by clicking on links in the tables below. Each current meter record is identified in the tables by its depth and the name of the mooring. You may want to look at a map of the array to see where the moorings were. A brief description of the experiment also is available. If you download any of the current meter records you should review the note on file format. From here you can also move up one level to the list of WOCE experiments.

October 1993 - September 1994

mooringinstr depthinstr typedatesmetadatadownload
cm02-1 692 meters Aanderaa RCM 20 Oct 93 - 18 Sep 94 view metadata download record
cm03-1 605 meters Aanderaa RCM 20 Oct 93 - 19 Sep 94 view metadata download record
cm03-1 1036 meters Aanderaa RCM 20 Oct 93 - 19 Sep 94 view metadata download record
cm04-1 588 meters Aanderaa RCM 20 Oct 93 - 18 Sep 94 view metadata download record
cm04-1 1419 meters Aanderaa RCM 20 Oct 93 - 18 Sep 94 view metadata download record
cm05-1 671 meters Aanderaa RCM 25 Oct 93 - 17 Sep 94 view metadata download record
cm05-1 1497 meters Aanderaa RCM 25 Oct 93 - 17 Sep 94 view metadata download record
cm05-1 2402 meters Aanderaa RCM 25 Oct 93 - 17 Sep 94 view metadata download record
cm06-1 659 meters Aanderaa RCM 26 Oct 93 - 15 Sep 94 view metadata download record
cm06-1 1485 meters Aanderaa RCM 26 Oct 93 - 15 Sep 94 view metadata download record
cm06-1 2990 meters Aanderaa RCM 26 Oct 93 - 15 Sep 94 view metadata download record
cm06-1 4595 meters Aanderaa RCM 26 Oct 93 - 15 Sep 94 view metadata download record
cm07-1 535 meters Aanderaa RCM 26 Oct 93 - 14 Sep 94 view metadata download record
cm07-1 1361 meters Aanderaa RCM 26 Oct 93 - 14 Sep 94 view metadata download record
cm08-1 506 meters Aanderaa RCM 27 Oct 93 - 14 Sep 94 view metadata download record
cm08-1 1336 meters Aanderaa RCM 27 Oct 93 - 14 Sep 94 view metadata download record
cm08-1 2843 meters Aanderaa RCM 27 Oct 93 - 14 Sep 94 view metadata download record
cm09-1 492 meters Aanderaa RCM 19 Oct 93 - 12 Sep 94 view metadata download record
cm09-1 1322 meters Aanderaa RCM 19 Oct 93 - 12 Sep 94 view metadata download record
cm09-1 2829 meters Aanderaa RCM 19 Oct 93 - 12 Sep 94 view metadata download record
cm10-1 457 meters Aanderaa RCM 18 Oct 93 - 10 Sep 94 view metadata download record
cm10-1 1287 meters Aanderaa RCM 18 Oct 93 - 10 Sep 94 view metadata download record

September 1994 - November 1995

mooringinstr depthinstr typedatesmetadatadownload
cm02-2 683 meters Aanderaa RCM 19 Sep 94 - 09 Nov 95 view metadata download record
cm03-2 626 meters Aanderaa RCM 19 Sep 94 - 09 Nov 95 view metadata download record
cm03-2 1057 meters Aanderaa RCM 19 Sep 94 - 24 Nov 95 view metadata download record
cm04-2 676 meters Aanderaa RCM 18 Sep 94 - 09 Nov 95 view metadata download record
cm04-2 1487 meters Aanderaa RCM 18 Sep 94 - 25 Nov 95 view metadata download record
cm05-2 555 meters Aanderaa RCM 17 Sep 94 - 09 Nov 95 view metadata download record
cm05-2 1381 meters Aanderaa RCM 17 Sep 94 - 25 Nov 95 view metadata download record
cm05-2 2286 meters Aanderaa RCM 17 Sep 94 - 25 Nov 95 view metadata download record
cm06-2 526 meters Aanderaa RCM 16 Sep 94 - 09 Nov 95 view metadata download record
cm06-2 1352 meters Aanderaa RCM 16 Sep 94 - 26 Nov 95 view metadata download record
cm06-2 4531 meters Aanderaa RCM 16 Sep 94 - 25 Oct 95 view metadata download record
cm07-2 483 meters Aanderaa RCM 15 Sep 94 - 09 Nov 95 view metadata download record
cm09-2 649 meters Aanderaa RCM 12 Sep 94 - 20 Nov 95 view metadata download record
cm09-2 1479 meters Aanderaa RCM 12 Sep 94 - 20 Nov 95 view metadata download record
cm09-2 2986 meters Aanderaa RCM 12 Sep 94 - 20 Nov 95 view metadata download record
cm10-2 763 meters Aanderaa RCM 10 Sep 94 - 20 Nov 95 view metadata download record
cm10-2 1593 meters Aanderaa RCM 10 Sep 94 - 20 Nov 95 view metadata download record
cm10-2 3098 meters Aanderaa RCM 10 Sep 94 - 09 Nov 95 view metadata download record

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Description of WOCE component PCM5

Most information about the transport of the Kuroshio Current has been provided by geostrophic calculation under the assumption of no motion at some abyssal depth. There have been few direct measurements of the transport, and (prior to PCM5) none that produced long time series.

The PCM5 dataset, which contains the first successful long-term direct current measurements from this region, was gathered by the ASUKA group (Affiliated Surveys of the Kuroshio off Cape Ashizuri). Ten current meter moorings were installed along a line extending southeastward from Cape Ashizuri (see map) . This line was chosen to coincide with a subsatellite track of TOPEX/POSEIDON, which has been measuring the sea surface height since 1992. Together with the field observations, the altimetry data give a fairly long continuous record of the Kuroshio transport. A WOCE goal is to combine this information with trans-Pacific hydrographic data along 30N (WHP line P2) to produce an estimate of the net meridional heat transport of the mid-latitude North Pacific.

The current meter moorings were installed in October 1993. They were replaced during September 1994 and finally recovered in November 1995. All of the moorings were instrumented with Aanderaa RCM7 and RCM8 current meters. Two of the moorings carried upward-looking ADCP's. (The ADCP data were not furnished to CMDAC and are not present here.)

Related publications

Imawaki, S. et al (1997): Time series of the Kuroshio transport derived from field observations and altimetry data. International WOCE Newsletter #25, February 1997, pp 15-18.

Imawaki, S. et al (1998): Estimates of transport of the Kuroshio off Shikoku. Bulletin of the Research Institute for Applied Mechanics, Kyushu University #82, pp 97-112 (in Japanese).

Kashima, M. et al (2000): Velocity fluctuations around the inertial frequency in the Kuroshio and its recirculation regions south of Japan. Bulletin of the Research Institute for Applied Mechanics, Kyushu University #117, pp 71-77 (in Japanese).

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Format of the current records

These files have been compressed with the ZIP compression utility. After downloading them, you will need to expand them. On a PC, WinZip or Pkunzip will do the job. Other utilities are available for the Unix and Macintosh environments. After expansion, you will have ascii files in OSU's stranger format.

The stranger format begins with several lines of header information that are meant to be machine-readable. They contain a Fortran format specification that will be useful in reading the file, a pointer to the first line of data, and a description of the data. Each line of the current record itself contains the time of the sample, the values recorded, and a line count.

Please be aware that end-of-line in these files is a carriage-return plus line-feed (the PC convention). This means that in a Unix environment (where a single line-feed serves as end-of-line) you may want to remove the carriage-returns.

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