Abstract:
Data from Geostationary Operational Environmental
Satellites are used to study the seasonal evolution of
temperature fronts in the northern California Current
System (CCS), focusing on the interactions with
topographic features. Fronts first appear close to the coast
in response to upwelling winds, moving offshore with the
continuous input of energy to the system. Late in the
upwelling season (after July), the upwelling front is
persistently found over deeper waters south of Heceta
Bank, Oregon, than north of it, suggesting that the
equatorward jet separates from the shelf at Heceta Bank.
Inshore of the upwelling front, weak gradients are found on
the Bank. The interaction of the equatorward flow with
Heceta Bank and Cape Blanco, Oregon, farther south,
substantially increases the mesoscale activity and oceanic
frontal habitat downstream to the south in the CCS, where
fronts are persistently found greater than 100 km from the
coast.
