Background Information

Nauru99 was a field project that studied the tropical ocean and atmosphere around the island of Nauru in the central western Pacific ocean. The project ias part of an on-going campaign by the ARM (Atmospheric Radiation Measurement) program of the U.S. Department of Energy to study global climate. Two highly instrumented research vessels, the R/V Mirai operated by the Japan Marine Science and Technology Center (JAMSTEC) and the R/V Ron Brown operated by NOAA were deployed for the project. ARM has a long term climate monitoring station on the island and one aim of the Nauru99 campaign was to calibrate this station against measurements made by the ships off the coast of the island. This activity both checked the instruments and also helped determine how representative the island measurements were of the surrounding ocean. The campaign conducted a detailed study of the interactions between the tropical ocean and atmosphere and also provided a test-bed for new technologies for climate monitoring.

INSTRUMENTS

NCAR/ATD operated a range of instruments on both the R/V Mirai and the R/V Ron Brown.

  • R/V Mirai Picture of profilers on the deck of the Mirai
  • MAPR (Multiple Antenna Profiler Radar) an advanced wind profiler radar capable of making rapid measurements of the wind profile overhead
  • DBS (Doppler Beam Swinging) Wind Profiler radar for making regular wind measurements
  • RASS (Radio Acoustic Sounding System), which uses the DBS Wind Profiler to track sound waves in order to measure air temperature above the ship
  • Microwave Radiometer to measure integrated liquid water vapor above the ship. The radiometer was supplied by Radiometrics Corporation and was run using software supplied by Jim Liljegren
  • Sea surface temperature using a "sea snake" sensor
  • Surface meteorology sensors to monitor wind, temperature, humidity, and long and short wave solar radiation
  • Navigation (GPS and flux-gate magnetometer) and tilt/roll sensors to correct wind measurements for ship motion

NCAR also maintained a vertically pointing S-Band radar on the Mirai for NOAA/ETL. Further information on the DBS wind profiler, RASS, and surface meteorology sensors is on the Integrated Sounding System page.

  • R/V Ron Brown
  • HRDL (High Resolution Doppler Lidar) supplied by NOAA/ETL to make high resolution wind and aerosol measurements