PLOCAN, the Spanish Institute of Oceanography (IEO) and the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (ULPGC) continue to promote and strengthen their collaboration in the ocean-observing strategy in the Canary Islands through the seasonal program based on glider missions at the Time-Series station ESTOC (deep node of the PLOCAN Integrated Observatory) and Deep Radial of the Canary Islands: Study and observation of the climate variability of the subtropical gyre in the Eastern Central Atlantic (Radial RAPROCAN), managed by PLOCAN and the IEO respectively.
Within this strategy framework, they have scheduled a new mission that, under the distinctive ESTOC 2023_4 and three weeks duration, has a scheduled journey of approximately two hundred nautical miles, performing dives every three hours at a depth of one thousand meters using a SeaExplorer unit that belongs to PLOCAN’s fleet of autonomous marine vehicles.
This seasonal glider program has the main goal to contribute to the continuity of the ESTOC and RAPROCAN time series, through systematic ocean observations through the use of more efficient and sustainable autonomous technologies that are traditional methodologies such as oceanographic vessels.
The ESTOC 2023_4 mission will enable to collect more than one million data on each of the six biogeochemical parameters of seawater observed (temperature, conductivity, dissolved oxygen, plankton, chlorophyll and turbidity), all in line with current programs, projects, international standards and methodologies regarding the observation of the oceanic environment.
The collected data will also be used by researchers from the Skidaway Oceanographic Institute of the University of Georgia (USA) within the framework of the SeaHawk program, and the Biological Oceanography Group belonging to the Institute of Oceanography and Global Change (IOCAG) of the ULPGC.
PLOCAN, as gliderport infrastructure member of leading international initiatives and working groups such as EGO, EuroGOOS, OceanGliders, OceanSites, EMSO, etc., contributes with this initiative both to the implementation of international protocols and standards for the operation of autonomous platforms. ocean monitoring, as well as the dissemination of the data generated. An example is the contribution to the European strategy for the management and standardization of marine data through direct cooperation with the Coriolis and EMODNet initiatives, which makes it possible to have the data collected by the glider in each of the dives in real time, with quality control and standardized European format.
More information at PLOCAN Glider Portal.
