Tuesday, May 24, 2021
I’ve got on the R/V Mirai today. While the cruise is dedicated mainly to the maintenance of the mooring buoys and one super site, a member from DCOP will join the cruise to conduct special radiosonde observations until early July.
The special radiosonde observation directly measures ozone and water vapor in addition to wind velocity, temperature, relative humidity that can be obtained by standard radiosonde. In addition to these observations, we will also conduct “high-altitude” radiosonde observations using a 3,000g balloon to observe wind velocity and temperature from the ocean surface to an altitude of around 40km.
The purpose of this observation is to observe the material transport associated with the boreal summer monsoon and convective intraseasonal variability. The R/V Mirai will depart from Shimizu Port on May 26 and travel equatorward in the the western tropical Pacific. After that the R/V Mirai will cruise northwestward tendering the mooring buoys at several sites, then she is scheduled to occupy one site around 13.5N, 137E to conduct fixed-point observations for two weeks. The special radiosonde observation will be performed once a day during the cruise and every two days during the fixed-point observation period.
Today, I (SO) set up three antennas for the special radiosonde observations at the rooftop of the aft wheelhouse (next to the GPS dome antenna on the far left).
(SO・TK)
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