FTV Surface Velocity Program Drifter Buoy Launched

Drift Buoy Launch Team

On the evening of January 27th, at approximately 1900, a group of Cadets from the TS Kennedy assisted the NOAA, National Weather Service representative, Rob Niemeyer, in deploying a Surface Velocity Program (SVP) Drifter buoy in the southern Pacific at approximately 2° degrees North Latitude, 82° West Longitude. A second drifter buoy by a second group of cadets the next morning at sunrise at a position of approximately 5° North Latitude, 83° West Longitude.

A drifter nicknamed holey sock. 

The drifter buoys are a high-tech version of the "message in a bottle".  It consists of a surface buoy and a subsurface drogue (sea anchor), attached by a long, thin tether.  The buoy measures temperature and other properties, and has a transmitter to send the data to passing satellites. The drogue/sea anchor dominates the total area of the instrument and is centered at a depth of 15 meters beneath the sea surface so that the dominant buoy drift is influenced by the ocean currents, not the surface wind flow and waves.  The Drifter Buoys can provide over 400 days of information to analysts ashore.
Learn more about SVP's
Explore: A Drifter Model

The hopes of the two drifter buoys deployed by the Cadets of the TS Kennedy are that they will provide valuable information to analysts about the “El Nino” located in the southern pacific. El Nino is characterized by unusually warm ocean temperatures in the Equatorial Pacific.

Weather is important to all that go to sea and it is regularly monitored by the bridge cadets. This special project by the NOAA emphasizes the importance of of marine vessels to monitor daily weather conditions both in their current location as well as the weather along the planned course. The cadets on the TS Kennedy are trained to monitor weather during their watches, as weather affects the ships course. On the bridge temperature and pressure measurements along with observing clouds, reading surface maps, and observing waves are among daily watch activities. These observations are forwarded to NOAA everyday so that the information can be shared with other ships traveling in the same area.

Collecting Weather Data and Keeping a Weather Log
Use the Internet to observe Weather
Cloudy Weather
Whichever Way the Wind Blows