Sixty-day simulations of flow on the Oregon continental shelf are performed using the Blumberg and Mellor sigma coordinate, primitive equation model. The model is two-dimensional (an across-shelf section) with high spatial resolution and realistic shelf topography. Forcing consists of surface heat flux, either hourly or low-pass filtered wind stress, and...
Time-dependent upwelling on the Oregon continental shelf is studied with a two-dimensional approximation, that is, spatial variations across-shelf and with depth, using the Blumberg–Mellor, finite-difference, stratified, primitive equation model. The time-dependent response of a coastal ocean at rest to constant, upwelling favorable, wind stress is examined. Topography and stratification representative...
There is a software gap in parallel processing. The short lifespan and small installation base of parallel architectures have made it economically infeasible to develop platform-specific parallel programming environments that deliver performance and programmability. One obvious solution is to build architecture-independent programming environments. But the architecture independence usually comes at...
A high-resolution numerical model with idealized topography is used to investigate the degree to which a coastal upwelling jet separates from the shelf as it flows around a submarine bank depending on the wind strength and the horizontal scale of the bank. Experiments were run using several wind forcing magnitudes...
Surface heat flux components are estimated at a midshelf site over the northern California shelf using moored measurements from the 1981-1982 Coastal Ocean Dynamics Experiment (CODE) and the 1988-1989 Shelf Mixed Layer Experiment (SMILE). Time series of estimated fluxes extend from early winter through summer upwelling conditions, allowing examination of...
A 1-km-horizontal-resolution model based on the Regional Ocean Modeling System is implemented along the Oregon coast to study average characteristics and intermittency of the M₂ internal tide during summer upwelling. Wind-driven and tidally driven flows are simulated in combination, using realistic bathymetry, atmospheric forcing, and boundary conditions. The study period...
Varied observations over Oregon’s continental shelf illustrate the
beauty and complexity of geophysical flows in coastal waters. Rapid, creative, and
sometimes fortuitous sampling from ships and moorings has allowed detailed looks
at boundary layer processes, internal waves (some extremely nonlinear), and coastal
currents, including how they interact. These processes drive...
Moored observations are used to investigate the seasonal change in vertical structure of the cross-shelf
circulation at a midshelf location in the northern California Current System. A streamwise–normal coordinate
system is employed to eliminate meander- and eddy-induced biases in the cross-shelf flow that are unaccounted
for with an alternative, commonly...
The Columbia River delivers the greatest amount of freshwater to the coastal ocean along the U.S. Pacific coast. This freshwater forms the Columbia River plume, a mesoscale plume with significant implications on coastal ocean physical, biological, chemical, and geological processes. The plume is transported south and offshore during the upwelling...
Observations from the Coastal Mixing and Optics (CMO) moored array (deployed from August 1996 through June 1997) and supplemental moored observations are used to describe near-inertial current variability over the New England shelf. Near-inertial band current variance comprises 10–20% of the total observed current variance, and has episodic peak speeds...