The Bering Slope Current System Revisited*

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Abstract
Mean circulation and water properties within the Aleutian Basin of the Bering Sea are investigated using hydrographic and subsurface park pressure displacement data from a regional array of 14 profiling CTD floats. After 10 days drifting at 1000 dbar, each float measures temperature and salinity profiles as it rises to the surface and then transmits these data via satellites, which also make several fixes of the float surface positions before it sinks again. Every fourth cycle, the floats sink from 1000 dbar to a 2000-dbar target just prior to ascent to measure deeper profiles. The 1000-dbar displacements estimated from the float surface position fixes reveal a coherent few-centimeters-per-second northwestward flow along the northeastern boundary, the deep signature of the Bering Slope Current. Middepth water property distributions are consistent with cyclonic advection of warm water from the south around the basin, eastward in the Aleutian North Slope Current, and then northwestward in the Berin... Abstract Mean circulation and water properties within the Aleutian Basin of the Bering Sea are investigated using hydrographic and subsurface park pressure displacement data from a regional array of 14 profiling CTD floats. After 10 days drifting at 1000 dbar, each float measures temperature and salinity profiles as it rises to the surface and then transmits these data via satellites, which also make several fixes of the float surface positions before it sinks again. Every fourth cycle, the floats sink from 1000 dbar to a 2000-dbar target just prior to ascent to measure deeper profiles. The 1000-dbar displacements estimated from the float surface position fixes reveal a coherent few-centimeters-per-second northwestward flow along the northeastern boundary, the deep signature of the Bering Slope Current. Middepth water property distributions are consistent with cyclonic advection of warm water from the south around the basin, eastward in the Aleutian North Slope Current, and then northwestward in the Berin...

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