Circulation and Heat Flux in the Bermuda Triangle

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Abstract
Data from the Atlantis 215 cruise from Cape Henry to Bermuda to Fort Pierce is analyzed to determine absolute geostrophic velocities in the region. The search procedure that Fiadeiro and Veronis (1982) proposed for finding an empirical level of no motion is used to obtain 3500 m as the average level which satisfies mass balance for the bottom three of the five layers that appeared to be conservative ones. Mass in the two upper layers is not conserved for any choice of a reference level. Since those two layers contain the Gulf Stream, which is known to have finite velocities near the bottom, an inverse calculation is used to provide a velocity correction in the boundary region so that all layers satisfy mass conservation. An improved method, summarized in the Appendix, is used to carry out the inverse calculation. The results include mass transports of 31 Sverdrups (Sv) through Fort Pierce 64 Sv past Cape Romain, and 91 Sv past Cape Hatteras in agreement with direct determination of transports. Al... Abstract Data from the Atlantis 215 cruise from Cape Henry to Bermuda to Fort Pierce is analyzed to determine absolute geostrophic velocities in the region. The search procedure that Fiadeiro and Veronis (1982) proposed for finding an empirical level of no motion is used to obtain 3500 m as the average level which satisfies mass balance for the bottom three of the five layers that appeared to be conservative ones. Mass in the two upper layers is not conserved for any choice of a reference level. Since those two layers contain the Gulf Stream, which is known to have finite velocities near the bottom, an inverse calculation is used to provide a velocity correction in the boundary region so that all layers satisfy mass conservation. An improved method, summarized in the Appendix, is used to carry out the inverse calculation. The results include mass transports of 31 Sverdrups (Sv) through Fort Pierce 64 Sv past Cape Romain, and 91 Sv past Cape Hatteras in agreement with direct determination of transports. Al...

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