New Zealand Journal of Marine and Freshwater Research abstracts
Drift currents in the southern New Zealand region as derived from Lagrangian measurements and the remote sensing of sea-surface temperature distributions
W. N. JENKS
Department of Geography
Monash University
Clayton
Victoria
Australia 3168
J. GRINDROD
Department of Biogeography and Geomorphology
Australian National University
Box 4, P.O.
Canberra
A.C.T., Australia 2600
J. A. PETERSON
Department of Geography
Monash University
Clayton
Victoria
Australia 3168
Abstract Four drift bottles, cast adrift south of the Subtropical Convergence at 48°S, 156°E in November 1980, landed within 123 days of release at a short stretch of coast north of Banks Peninsula. A high degree of coherence in the responsible drift pattern is indicated. The contemporary surface circulation inferred from satellite-derived sea-surface temperature distributions indicates that the bottles were entrained in a meridionally-converging flow after drifting across the southern Tasman Sea without crossing the Convergence. They were prevented from further eastward drifting because of a marked southward flexing of the Convergence east of the Southland Current during February 1981. Because of local weather and tide effects, the bottles finally beached in Pegasus Bay.
Keywords wind-driven currents; New Zealand; South Island; Southern Ocean; Subtropical Convergence; Lagrangian methods; drifters; temperature; surface water; remote sensing
New Zealand Journal of Marine and Freshwater Research, 1982, Vol. 16 : 359-371 Received 21 December 1981; accepted 21 May 1982
PDF file of entire paper: medium quality (1683K); (scanned from paper original: notes about this process)
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