OAR NW Weather

The voyage

OAR NW Canadian Wildlife Federation Africa to the Americas

• Launch: December 2012, Dakar, Senegal

Forecast info/links

Orientation map

Latest location (from Yellowbrick)

Things we like

• Angel's plots: GFS tropical Atlantic RH (shading), geopotential height (in green, 15 m contour interval), and temperature (red, 2 deg C contour interval) 1000 hPa (.pdf), 850 hPa (.pdf), 700 hPa (.pdf) / 1000 hPa (.png), 850 hPa (.png), 700 hPa (.png)
• Latest NHC TAFB analysis, hi res (pdf)
• ASCAT winds
• Weather underground model maps. Click and drag map to the tropical Atlantic. In the Layers list, scroll down to Model data, click the cog wheel for Settings, get ECMWF, choose your field, drag the forecast bar out as far as you want, hit play.
• Satellite imagery, Caribbean view (I like Java Visible and rainbow IR loops)
• Surface currents (RTOFS)
• Surface currents (HYCOM) E of 55 W, W of 55 W
• NOAA Wavewatch III
• NDBC buoys

In-house plots

• (Angel) GFS tropical Atlantic RH (shading), geopotential height (in green, 15 m contour interval), and temperature (red, 2 deg C contour interval)
  • 1000 hPa (.pdf), 1000 hPa (.png)
  • 850 hPa (.pdf), 850 hPa (.png)
  • 700 hPa (.pdf), 700 hPa (.png)
• Timeseries of data from boat (pdf) (png), updates hourly
• RTOFS surface current forecasts for the 3^2 degrees near boat. Colors are current speed, black contours are whole kts (1, 2, and 3). Arrows show current direction (but not speed; they're all the same length). Current data updates daily, boat position hourly. The stars show the latest boat position (the vertically-centered one) and the position 24 h before that (the non-centered one)
  • 1 AM last night (pdf), (png)
  • 8 AM tomorrow (pdf), (png)
  • 8 PM tomorrow (pdf), (png)
  • 8 AM day after tomorrow (pdf), (png)
  • every 6 h for next 72 h

Ocean observations

• AVISO satellite altimetry (wave height, surface height, geostrophic current, about it)
• Drifters (under Choose Dataset select GTS Buoys)

Big picture

• Tropical North Atlantic Clouds Satellite overviewVisible/IR Wave Tracking Winds Satellite image from CIMSS/University of Wisconsin
• Analysis and satellite imagery: CIMSS Tropical Cyclone page - Check out East Atlantic/Africa and North Atlantic Winds & Analysis and Images & Movies
• Discussion: NHC Atlantic Tropical Weather Discussion- Broad overview of current weather from Africa to the US from the National Hurricane Center in Miami
• Text forecast: NHC Atlantic Tropical Weather Outlook- Areas to watch for potential tropical storm formation
• Collection of model forecasts: Penn State Tropical Cyclone Group

Wind

• Satellite Observations: ASCAT European scatterometer satellite (cousin of the late QuikScat)
• Model forecast: NHC 10-m winds
• Plotted observations

Currents

• Ocean Prediction Center
• NLOM SSH, SST, SST anomalies, speed/current - with animated gifs!
• Surface currents: JPL ECCO Ocean data assmilation
• OSCAR current analysis - mean of last 5 days
• Learn the basics about different Atlantic currents: CIMAS/RSMAS/UM
  • Canary
  • North Equatorial
  • Antilles
  • Florida
• David Burch Current Blog

Waves

• NOAA Wavewatch III
• Links from Stormsurf
• Naval Oceanography Portal
• NOAA OPC - nice rainbow colored plots of wave period (scroll down)

Sea Surface Temperatures

• JPL
• NCEP SST
• NHC

Tidal currents

• from NOAA
• Site where you can make graphs
• More tides and currents

Misc links

• David Burch: Starpath links, Expedition Nav Blog, David Burch Current Blog
• bckayaker.com
• Salish Sea Expedition link page