[27-Feb-2014] Farrar, J.T., Plueddemann, A.J., Kessler, W.S., Rainville, L., and Hodges, B.A.
Presented at the 2014 Ocean Sciences MeetingThe Salinity Processes Upper-ocean Regional Study (SPURS) was a field campaign focused on understanding the physical processes acting to maintain the climatological sea surface salinity (SSS) maximum in the subtropical North Atlantic. An upper-ocean salinity budget provides a useful framework for guiding progress toward that goal. The SPURS measurement program included a heavily instrumented air-sea interaction mooring, which allows accurate estimates of the surface fluxes, and a dense array of measurements from moorings, Argo floats, and gliders. These data will be used to estimate terms in the upper-ocean salinity and heat budgets during the year-long SPURS campaign, with the goal of gaining insight into the physical processes important to the evolution and maintenance of the SSS maximum. Here we report preliminary air-sea flux estimates and the evolution of upper ocean heat and freshwater content from the air-sea interaction mooring.