Current velocity data from a continuous survey using a towed ADCP in Wilmington River Estuary, Georgia, USA

Title:  Current velocity data from a continuous survey using a towed ADCP in Wilmington River Estuary, Georgia, USA

Author/Data Collector: Chunyan Li

Point of Contact, PI, Originator:  Chunyan Li (cli@lsu.edu)

Description:

These are velocity profile data from vessel towed ADCP obtained in the Wilmington River Estuary during a survey conducted on Sep. 29, 2004, for ~ 11.5 hours. The instrument was an RDI 600 KHz Workhorse ADCP.

The ADCP was mounted on a sled towed by the boat. The vertical bins were 0.5 m. The surveys were conducted at an average cruise speed of about 2.5–3 m/s except at the turns when the vessel had to slow down and during CTD casts when the vessel had to stop for a few minutes. A Seabird Electronic SBE 19 plus CTD was used to measure the vertical profiles of water temperature, salinity, fluorescence, light attenuation, and dissolved oxygen during the survey. Note that only ADCP data are included in this dataset.

The data are averaged at about 30-second intervals, excluding bad data. The data presented here are in ASCII with the generic format provided by the RDI’s software WinRiver II output. There are a total of two data files. There are:

ADCP_Sep29_2004_WM_000_ASC.TXT

ADCP_Sep29_2004_WM_001_ASC.TXT

Here is an example of the data –

    50     50     42     50      1     20      1

4 9 29 11 32 26 57   468     60    2.361   -0.824  118.753   24.276

49.04    93.15    -0.17    -0.46     0.00     6.00     0.00     3.08     6.63     6.64     6.68     6.59

30.53        28.91        26.93        14.22        30.45

32.00327167   -81.01664167    31.50    92.41         30.4

-22.0          -7.2          -3.2         -11.2          10.0         -10.8          10.0  1.53   5.53

50 cm BT dB 0.43  0.073

  1.53     52.35    193.13  -11.9  -51.0   -0.3    3.5   92.1   94.8   94.6   95.6  100      -2.02

  2.03     49.89    189.47   -8.2  -49.2   -0.1   -2.1   97.7   99.9  100.4  100.4  100      -2.28

  2.53     52.68    187.22   -6.6  -52.3    0.7    4.0   99.0  101.3  101.7  101.2   98      -2.84

  3.03     48.92    190.92   -9.3  -48.0   -0.2    5.1   99.2  101.3  101.9  101.6  100      -2.21

  3.53     51.77    185.37   -4.8  -51.5    0.3    5.7   98.6  101.4  102.0  101.2  100      -2.99

  4.03     48.03    186.14   -5.1  -47.8    1.0    1.2   98.5  101.1  101.9  101.0  100      -2.64

  4.53     50.69    190.02   -8.8  -49.9    0.5    3.6   98.5  101.2  101.9  101.2  100      -2.32

  5.03     43.70    186.57   -5.0  -43.4    0.7    4.4   98.3  101.2  101.9  101.2  100      -2.34

  5.53     41.22    186.13   -4.4  -41.0    1.5   -0.3   98.5  101.6  102.0  101.4   83      -2.35

  6.03    -32768    -32768 -32768 -32768 -32768 -32768    255    255    255    255    0 2147483647

The ADCP data were used in Li et al. (2008).

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Captain Harry Carter who assisted me by driving the boat for the whole day. He also assisted me with CTD casts, deployment, and retrieval of other CTDs.  It was a great day working out with him.

References

Li, C., C. Chen, D. Guadagnoli, and I. Y. Georgiou (2008). Geometry-induced residual eddies in estuaries with curved channels: Observations and modeling studies, Journal of Geophysical Research, Vol. 113, C01005, doi:10.1029/2006JC004031.