ASA 127th Meeting M.I.T. 1994 June 6-10

2pUW6. Acoustic thermometry in the Northeast Pacific: 1983--1989.

John L. Spiesberger

Daniel Merdes

Dept. of Meteorol. and the Appl. Res. Lab., 512 Walker Bldg., Penn State Univ., University Park, PA 16802

Between 1983 and 1989, acoustic thermometers were used to measure basin-wide temperatures in the Northeast Pacific. One set of experiments was conducted between the Kaneohe source (133 Hz, 60-ms resolution) and about ten U. S. Navy SOSUS stations. The other set of experiments was conducted between three moored sources (250 Hz, 16-ms resolution) and the same SOSUS stations. Over 14 of the 16 sections, the multipaths can be understood using ray theory. Even though sound from the Kaneohe source interacts with the bottom many times, ray theory succeeds in interpreting the multipath pattern. In the summer of 1987, the Northeast Pacific is colder than climatology based on Levitus' atlas. [Work supported by Advanced Research Projects Agency and Office of Naval Research.]