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Southern Ocean Dynamics: A Strategy for Scientific Exploration, 1973-1983 (1974)

Chapter: SUMMARY OF PRINCIPAL RECOMMENDATIONS

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Suggested Citation:"SUMMARY OF PRINCIPAL RECOMMENDATIONS." National Research Council. 1974. Southern Ocean Dynamics: A Strategy for Scientific Exploration, 1973-1983. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/18713.
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Suggested Citation:"SUMMARY OF PRINCIPAL RECOMMENDATIONS." National Research Council. 1974. Southern Ocean Dynamics: A Strategy for Scientific Exploration, 1973-1983. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/18713.
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1 Summary of Principal Recommendations I. GENERAL The Working Group, noting that the continuing successful develop- ment of oceanographic experimental and theoretical capabilities indicates that long-term direct measurements and monitoring are now feasible in the South- ern Ocean, and further noting that the high logistics costs for polar experi- ments will require careful planning to ensure efficient use of funds, recom- mends the following: 1. A sequence of sharply focused ocean monitoring and dynamics experiments should be begun as soon as possible in the Southern Ocean for the purpose of contributing to the goal of understanding long-term, large- scale ocean and climate dynamics. 2. The management of such a program should include a continuing effort to review conceptual design, strategy, and interaction among Southern Ocean experiments and to review collaboration between this regional and other global oceanographic and meteorological programs. 3. Since antarctic physical oceanography provides a particularly good opportunity for international collaboration and pooling of effort, the ap- propriate government agencies should actively seek cooperation of scientists and sponsoring institutions of other nations in planning and carrying out these investigations. The sequence of experiments recommended above could form the U.S. nucleus of a program of International Southern Ocean Studies (ISOS) on ocean dynamics and monitoring in close cooperation with other global environmental monitoring programs. 4. Because of the mutual benefits to be gained, the experimental plan should be developed as soon as possible in order that adequate moni- toring systems are operable by 1977. In this way, maximum interaction with the First GARP Global Experiment (FGGE) and its subprogram POLEX- GARP (South) can be achieved. 1

2 Southern Ocean Dynamics 5. Every effort should be made to find means by which the un- finished circumpolar survey of the physical oceanography of the Southern Ocean can be completed so that the entire region is covered with a network of modern data for physical oceanography. II. SPECIFIC The Working Group, noting that data should be gathered through an integrated program of manned and unmanned stations and that the develop- ment of technology of remote sensing is to be encouraged, recommends three specific areas of study: 1. A program emphasizing presently available measurement tech- niques for the study of the large-scale transient dynamics of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current and its role in the general ocean circulation; 2. A program for direct observation of the processes involved in the formation of Antarctic Bottom Water and the determination of the amounts and variability of this formation; 3. A program to elucidate the structure of the strong frontal zones and their role in the formation of intermediate water masses and to monitor, with existing stations, exchange processes for overall budgets of heat, mass, and momentum in the region.

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