On the Use of Aerial SST Observations for Surface Submesoscale Flows

We will present an integrated aerial observation approach that is designed for observations of small scale phenomena in the oceanic surface layer. A high resolution near real time geo rectified map of Sea surface temperatures is produced using an airborne IR camera with an GNSS assisted IMU. The aerial observations are tightly integrated with observations from surface vessels and drifter releases during a field campaign in the Gulf of Mexico. Near realtime maps of SST are made available to the vessels over radio ethernet, providing targeting data and spatial context for surface observations. The combination of the use of many hundreds of drifters, sub-surface observations from vessels, and aerial observations is aimed at the dynamics of wintertime surface submesoscale flows.