“Eye of the Levantine ” project

Synopsis of TARA-OceansTARA Oceans is an international, 3 years long, around the world expedition, which aims

to assess the oceanic plankton dynamic at global scale. The main concept is to provide the oceanographic community with a unique platform, the TARA schooner, able to sustain a 3 years experiment.

Figure 1 : The Tara pathway (see also http://oceans.taraexpeditions.org/en/home-tara.php?id_page=1 )

EYE experiment

In this framework, a specific leg will be dedicated to an innovative experiment having as specific objective to study a persistent flow pattern south of Cyprus, an eddy somehow attached to the Eratosthene seamount. The ”EYE” (the Eye of the Levantine) project will take advantage of the synergies between ship-borne measurements from TARA (EYE/TARA) and data collected with a number of steerable autonomous platforms the so-called gliders (EYE/Gliders), to understand the dynamics of this remarkable oceanic feature in terms of flow, hydrology and phytoplankton :

1. the eastern Mediterranean Sea, and in particular the Levantine basin, is an oligotrophic (i.e. with very low presence of phytoplankton) ocean; its dynamic could be then considered representative of oceanic regions having similar behaviours (like the south Pacific Gyre);

2. south of Cyprus a permanent cyclonic structure has been recurrently observed during a few cruises during the last 2 decades and more continuously (but only at surface) with satellite. An accurate 3-dimensional survey of this structure is still lacking. This structure is supposed to create a physical barrier, which disconnects the “inside gyre” ecosystem dynamic to the “outside gyre” one; in a few kilometres two contrasting ecosystems may be presents.

Mission Plan Summary

The EYE project, lead by Fabrizio D’Ortenzio From LOV/CNRS and Pierre Testor LOCEAN/CNRS, is the result of an international partnership between France, Cyprus and Italy and involves many institutions that will provide and operate the gliders and provide support for the operations.

EYE/Gliders deployments : 6 gliders ; start on Nov. 19th and may last up to Nov. 24th. The duration of the deployments (so the date of recovery) depend on batteries charges with maximum expected duration of 3 months (end of Feb. 2010). Trieste 1 will be recovered before Dec. 20th.

EYE-TARA Cruise Period : 26 November – 12 December 2009Official TARA Stops: Athens (26-28 November), Limassol (8 December), Beyrouth (12

December)Technical Stops: Limassol (1 December)Glider Port: Limassol

Involved institutions and eople:

− Ecole Nationale de Techniques Avancees (ENSTA)− Laboratoire d'Oceanographie et de Climatologie (LOCEAN, France, Paris)− Laboratoire d'Oceanographie de Villefrance (LOV, France, Villefranche/m)− Division Technologique (DTINSU/CNRS, France, LaSeyne/m)− Oceanography Centre of the University of Cyprus (OCUCY, Cyprus, Nicosia)− Istituto Nazionale di Oceanografia e di Geofisica Sperimentale (OGS, Italy, Trieste)− Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB, Brussels, Belgium)− Stazione Zoologica (SZN, Italy, Naples)− Collecte Localisation Satellite (CLS, France, Toulouse)− MERCATOR (France, Toulouse)

Onboard TARA Fabrizio D’Ortenzio (LOV/CNRS, France,PI) Pierre Testor (LOCEAN/CNRS, France, Co-PI)Pascal Morin (SMR/CNRS, France)Alban Lazar (LOCEAN/IRD, France)Laurent Beguery (DT-INSU/CNRS, France)

On Land Louis Prieur (LOV/CNRS, France)Antoine Poteau (LOV/CNRS, France)Laurent Mortier (LOCEAN/ENSTA, France)Herve Claustre (LOV/CNRS, France)Vincent Taillandier (LOV/CNRS, France)Francesco D’Ovidio (LOCEAN/CNRS, France)

George Zodiatis (UCY, Cyprus)Dan Hayes(UCY, Cyprus)

Francois Lekien (ULB, Belgium)Yaros Ikramov (ULB, Belgium)

Daniele Iudicone (SZN, Italy) Pierre Marie Poulain (OGS, Italy)Elena Mauri (OGS, Italy)Riccardo Gerin (OGS, Italy)

Stephanie Guinehut (CLS, France)Gaetan Vinay (Mercator, France)Blandine Lheveder (LOCEAN/CNRS, France)Alexandre Stegner (LMD/CNRS, France)Romain Pennel (ENSTA, France)Isabelle Taupier-Letage (COM/CNRS, France)Gilles Reverdin (LOCEAN/CNRS, France)Karim Bernardet (DT-INSU/CNRS, France)David Stuart (DT-INSU/CNRS, France)Karim Mahiouz (DT-INSU/CNRS, France)Nagib Bhairy (DT-INSU/CNRS, France)

Stations and Deployments

1) EYE/TARA

draft of planned track for ship Tara in table/figures below

Rosette Stations “Standard” • ~10 profiles down to 1000 m depth• CTD, ISUS (NO3), Fluo, Backscattering, Transmittance, PVM• 10 Depths bottles for NO3, NO2, PO4, Si4, HPLC (2 surface, 3 on depth, 5 on

depth)

Rosette “Couronne” • ~10 profiles down to 200-300 m depth• CTD, ISUS (NO3), Fluo, Backscattering, Transmittance, PVM• 5-6 Depths bottles for NO3, NO2, PO4, Si4, HPLC

Drifter deployments• 4 surface drifters to deploy on points d1, d2, d3, d4

Floats deployments• 2 floats to deploy on points d2 and d4

2) EYE/Gliders Eudoxus: Slocum glider 1000m

CTD, Fluo ChlA, Fluo CDOM, Oxygen, Backscatter at 470, 533, 660, 880 nmHannon: Slocum deep glider 1000m

CTD, Fluo ChlA, Fluo CDOM, Backscatter at 470, 533, 660, 880 nmBonpland : Slocum deep glider 1000m

CTDTrieste 1: Slocum 200m glider 200m

CTD, Oxygen, Fluo ChlA, TurbidityPytheas: Slocum surface glider, 200m

CTD, trans, Oxygen, Fluo ChlA, TurbidityAtalanta : Seaglider 1000m (Atalanta or Pheidippides?)

CTD, Fluo Chla, Oxy, Backscatter Blue (470nm), Backscatter Red (660nm)

draft of planned tracks for gliders in table/figures below.

Figures Legend:

Green area: supposed position of the gyre to be checked with altimetry, visible and SST images

Black Lines: deep gliders trackRed Lines: surface gliders trackWhite Line: TARA TrackBlue boat: TARA positionYellow Lines: predicted glider tracks White points: drifter and floats deployment points

Time Period EYE/Tara EYE/Gliders19-23 Nov to 1 Dec 22Nov-26Nov:

Toward Athens26Nov-28Nov:

Athens28Nov-3Nov:

Toward Limassol1 Dec : stop

Limassol to board floats and drifters

19-20 Nov and 23-25 Nov: deployment of all Gliders; Starting Principal transect from Limassol.

Final position of Eudoxus: 33°N 32.5E

Distance from Eudoxus to Trieste1 and Pytheas : 10 Km

Distance between Eudoxus, Hannon and Bonpland : 30 Km

1 Dec – 3 Dec Principal Transect:Deployment drifters

and floats14 Standard Stations

equally spaced between D2 and D4 (only less close at the end of transect)

Hannon, Eudoxus, Bonpland go north

Trieste_1 and Pytheas start positioning for “couronne” (see later)

Atalanta (or Pheidippides) provide large coverage of the area (see later)

Time Period EYE/TARA EYE/Gliders3 Dec – 5 Dec 3 Dec– 4Dec:

Toward meeting with Pytheas and Trieste_1

5 Dec : “Couronne” Transect, about 7-8 “Couronne” Stations

Hannon, Eudoxus, Bonpland go north

Trieste_1 and Pytheas start “Couronne” experiment: very short intersecting transects following the border of the structure

Atalanta (or Pheidippides) provide large coverage of the area

6 Dec 6 Dec : In side transect

Hannon, Eudoxus, Bonpland terminate north transect

Trieste_1 and Pytheas “Couronne” experiment (see panel)

Atalanta (or Pheidippides) provide large coverage of the area

Time Period EYE/TARA EYE/Gliders7 Dec 7 Dec : Gliders-

TARA MeetingHannon, Eudoxus, Bonpland

Gliders Tara MeetingTrieste_1 and Pytheas continue

“Couronne” experiment

8 Dec – 9 Dec Limassol: Official Stop, Laurent Beguery and Pascal Morin on land

Hannon, Eudoxus, Bonpland go south and start EGO adaptive sampling experiment

Trieste 1 and Pytheas Continue “Couronne” experiment

10 Dec – 12 Dec Beyrouth: end of campaign

Hannon, Eudoxus, Bonpland continue EGO adaptive sampling experiment

Trieste_1 and Pytheas continue “Couronne” experiment

Atalanta (or Pheidippides) provide large coverage of the area (see panel)

13 Dec – … Hannon, Eudoxus, Bonpland continue EGO adaptive sampling experiment (see panel)

Trieste_1 and Pytheas continue “Couronne” experiment (Trieste 1 stops near Dec. 20th)

Atalanta (or Pheidippides) provide large coverage of the area (see panel)

EYE/Gliders servers and organization

1) Landstations and plotservers

Responsible persons : Karim Bernardet and Laurent Mortier

Landstations: these are the 'dockservers' for slocums and the 'basestation' for seagliders that handle the two-way iridium communications with the gliders. They retrieve data from the gliders and send new commands to them, if required.

Plotservers: retrieve the glider data from landstations produce a number of plots important to check the 'health' of the gliders and if new commands were correctly interpreted and publish them on the web. These plotservers also provide processing resources for additional information (SSH, SST, …).

Glider Fleet Control Panel (GFCP): this is a web-based interface that will be used to transfer new commands to the gliders via landstations.

Pytheas, Hannon, Eudoxus and Bonpland use dockserver helios02@locean-ipsl.upmc.fr. Backup dockserver at TWR. Local resp. L. Mortier <mortier@locean-ipsl.upmc.fr>

Trieste_1 uses dockserver ogadock.ogs.trieste.it. Backup dockserver helios02@locean-ipsl.upmc.fr. Local resp. for the network Antonio Bussani <antonio.bussani@gmail.com>

Atalanta uses basestation cyocean(194.42.21.99). Local resp. Dan Hayes <dhayes@ucy.ac.cy>

All landstations must have ssh link on both direction with the − plotserver at LOCEAN (thot.locean-ipsl.upmc.fr)

All landstations must be reachable with ssh link by the − GFCP server at LOCEAN (skyros.locean-ipsl.upmc.fr)

Permanent ssh tunnels using autossh is the best. The plotserver at LOCEAN provides individual information for all gliders and a synthetical view of the whole fleet.For individual glider information, see right menu on:− http://www.locean-ipsl.upmc.fr/gliders/EGO/

For the 'fleet view', see:− http://www.locean-ipsl.upmc.fr/gliders/EGO/plot_deployment.php?observatory=MED-

Eastern

2) Web and ftp servers

Responsible persons : Karim Bernardet and Laurent Mortier

Two EGO webservers will be used.

http://www.ego-network.org/ is the official site of the EGO network. It provides general information on gliders, and a forum (public and private). To participate to the forum, every participant must register to this site. THE USERIDS/PASSWORDS ARE ALSO VALID FOR THE GFCP SITE (www.locean-ipsl.upmc.fr/gliders/EGO) and the central repository

(www.locean-ipsl.upmc.fr/gliders/EYE).

http://www.locean-ipsl.upmc.fr/gliders/EGO is the old EGO site. Registration on this site is no more possible. This site provides access to the “Glider Fleet Control Panel” (GFCP) which is a web interface to pilot the gliders in a cooperative way (shift organization). It also provides web access to the plots for the gliders and the EYE experiment (see right menu).

The repository http:// www.locean-ipsl.upmc.fr/gliders/EYE/ will gather all the information provided by the participants (post processed SSH maps, FSLE/FTLE and LCS maps, …). Please, provide to gliderman@locean-ipsl.upmc.fr with your ftp or http site address (and userid/passwd if any) where you intend to put your products. They will be uploaded regularly and made available in http:// www.locean-ipsl.upmc.fr/gliders/EYE/ . You can also put your products on the anonymous ftp server ftp.ocean-ipsl.upmc.fr (userid=anonymous, passwd=your email, cd LOCEAN/EYE and then put your file).

3) Captains and pilots

Responsible persons : All the glider captains

All the phone/cellular numbers of responsible persons for the gliders must be on the EGO phone directory.

All the gliders have an GFCP file with the name of the main and second pilots. The deployment Cyprus09 has been created but additional information is needed : the name of the pilots as well as the calendar of the shifts. They must also provide all the technical information to access the landstations and the protocol to send commands (in principle we will use tunnelled scp).

Here is the list of the responsible persons. They could be changed during the experiment. Glider Captain Second captainPytheas Laurent Mortier Karim BernardetTrieste_1 Riccardo Gerin (change ?) ?Bonpland Karim Bernardet Laurent MortierHannon Laurent Mortier Karim BernardetEudoxus Karim Bernardet Laurent MortierAtalanta Dan Hayes ?

Glider captains are in charge of forming small crews for each glider, in order to watch them over long periods.

4) Science group to manage the fleet

Responsible persons : Laurent Mortier, Pierre Testor, Dan Hayes(?), Elena Mauri(?),...

This is the innovative part of the project because the sampling strategy can be adapted to the environment into details. Gliders are piloted by their crew but every day, the group responsible for the scientific objectives of the fleet (as sketched in the Mission Plan Summary) will provide aimed positions and waypoints resulting in the 'best' sampling we can imagine.

Every week, one person will be in charge of the animation of the group. This implies to:- Ensure that the data flows are active (help from the web/ftp servers responsible

persons).- Provide on the forum a synthetic view of the environment of the gliders as

analysed by the various products delivered by the participants.

- Provide to the participants a first guess of the waypoint of the gliders.- Gather the feedbacks of the participants.- Send the aimed waypoints to the pilots which are responsible to send them to the

gliders as well as other necessary command (speed, nominal depth, …).- During the EYE/Tara cruise, this person will be in charge to send recommendations

to the TARA scientific crew for updated CTD stations positions as well as the a daily positions and direction of the gliders.

- Designate and make the relay with the next responsible, to compose the group of active participants (4-5 from the whole group) for the next week.

A simple web interface will be opened to provide and disseminate the waypoints to the participant AND TO THE GFCP AND PLOTSERVERS : Charts and files with the waypoints will be available on the web.

Available products : Daily AVISO gridded SSH and SSA, daily SST and Sea Color from the ACRI Globcolour (http://www.globcolour.info/) service. Other possible products : Mercator analysis and forecast, Forecast of the glider trajectories by the OPAGLI simulator running at LOCEAN, post-processed products such as FSLE charts based on SSA/SSH, rectified SSH and surface velocity maps with surface drifters trajectories, …

Participants : Dan Hayes, Pierre-Marie Poulain, Francois Lekien, Daniele Iudicone, Francesco D’Ovidio, Vincent Taillandier, Pierre Testor, Fabrizio d’Ortenzio, Laurent Mortier. OTHER PARTICIPANTS ARE WELCOME, UP TO A MANAGABLE NUMBER. EVERY PARTICIPANT MUST REGISTER ON THE WEB SITE. THEY WILL HAVE WRITE ACCESS TO THE DEDICATED FORUM PAGES.

5) Group for the adaptive sampling

Responsible person : Francois Lekien

This group is in charge to run the algorithm developed by Francois Lekien to maintain a triangular shape of the “Bonpland, Hannon, Eudoxus” fleet. AVISO SSH and MERCATOR analysis/forecast products will be available. Namely this group will deliver every 6 hours (or maybe every day?) new waypoints for this fleet to the science group. Obviously, the most recent positions of the gliders will be made available as soon as possible on the main http/ftp site. Conventions for naming and exchanging files in an automated way must be established.

Participants : Francois Lekien, Yaros Ikramov, Vincent Taillandier, Blandine Lheveder, Laurent Mortier, Francesco D’Ovidio

6) Mailing lists and URLs

Ask to mortier@locean-ipsl.upmc.fr to be added on the mailing lists you are interested. The initial composition of these lists is as proposed in the following.

− “EYE” general list : eye@dt.insu.cnrs.fr− Science group : eye_science @dt.insu.cnrs.fr − “Adaptive” group : eye_adapt @dt.insu.cnrs.fr

− Official EGO website (registration, wiki, forum, ...) :http://www.ego-network.org. Link to 'EYE EXPERIMENT' in the left menu.

− Old EGO website for the GFCP and the NRT plots :http://www.locean-ipsl.upmc.fr/gliders/EGO (same userid and passwd)

− Ftp anonymous at LOCEAN:ftp.ocean-ipsl.upmc.fr (userid=anonymous, passwd=your email, cd LOCEAN/EYE

− Central repository :

http://www.locean-ipsl.upmc.fr/gliders/EYE (same userid and passwd)

Please provide to mortier@locean-ipsl.upmc.fr your ftp or http site address (and userid/passwd if any) where you intend to put you products.