Large Volume of Warm Water outside the Gulf Stream

Abstract

Mixed layer depths are presented for the mid-latitude North Atlantic obtained from BT (bathythermograph) measurements for a 40 degree longitude band starting at Africa and moving west along 30 N. During February, 1959, 250 BTs were made in this region and they all show a distinct mixed layer depth greater than or equal to 85 meters. By comparing this east/west vertical temperature section with two other BT sections, one along 16 N and the other along 40 N taken one year earlier, but also in the cooling season (October, November), it is proposed that there was a northward drift in the surface layer between 16 N and 40 N that was cooled from above. Such a wide poleward flow of warm water, outside the Gulf Stream, is suggested to be the analogue of the permanent wide warm current off California in the North Pacific studied in some detail earlier.