Can Submerged Buoys be Reliably Used for Monitoring Tsunamis in the Indian Ocean?

2021 ◽  
Vol 55 (1) ◽  
pp. 127-136
Author(s):  
Ramasamy Venkatesan ◽  
Manickavasagam Arul Muthiah ◽  
Narayanaswamy Vedachalam ◽  
Karuppiah Thirumurugan ◽  
Punniyamoorthy Senthilkumar ◽  
...  

AbstractThe article proposes a novel and robust Continuously Homing Submerged Autonomous Tsunami Underwater System (CHATUR) in which the buoy is submerged at a depth of 300 m, collecting sea-level data during normal conditions and surfacing during a tsunami event to transmit the event data. By on-demand reliability analysis, a system in the Bay of Bengal requires health monitoring at an interval of 13 days. By offshore experiments and numerical simulations, the configuration increases the tsunami warning time by ~2 min.

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mirjam van der Mheen ◽  
Erik van Sebille ◽  
Charitha Pattiaratchi

Abstract. A large percentage of global ocean plastic waste enters the northern hemisphere Indian Ocean (NIO). Despite this, it is unclear what happens to buoyant plastics in the NIO. Because the subtropics in the NIO is blocked by landmass, there is no subtropical gyre and no associated subtropical garbage patch in this region. We therefore hypothesise that plastics "beach" and end up on coastlines along the Indian Ocean rim. In this paper, we determine the influence of beaching plastics by applying different beaching conditions to Lagrangian particle tracking simulation results. Our results show that a large amount of plastic likely ends up on coastlines in the NIO, while some crosses the equator into the southern hemisphere Indian Ocean (SIO). In the NIO, the transport of plastics is dominated by seasonally reversing monsoonal currents, which transport plastics back and forth between the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal. All buoyant plastic material in this region beaches within a few years in our simulations. Countries bordering the Bay of Bengal are particularly heavily affected by plastics beaching on coastlines. This is a result of both the large sources of plastic waste in the region, as well as ocean dynamics which concentrate plastics in the Bay of Bengal. During the intermonsoon period following the southwest monsoon season (September, October, November), plastics can cross the equator on the eastern side of the NIO basin into the SIO. Plastics that escape from the NIO into the SIO beach on eastern African coastlines and islands in the SIO or enter the subtropical SIO garbage patch.


2012 ◽  
Vol 42 (4) ◽  
pp. 602-627 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laurie L. Trenary ◽  
Weiqing Han

Abstract The relative importance of local versus remote forcing on intraseasonal-to-interannual sea level and thermocline variability of the tropical south Indian Ocean (SIO) is systematically examined by performing a suite of controlled experiments using an ocean general circulation model and a linear ocean model. Particular emphasis is placed on the thermocline ridge of the Indian Ocean (TRIO; 5°–12°S, 50°–80°E). On interannual and seasonal time scales, sea level and thermocline variability within the TRIO region is primarily forced by winds over the Indian Ocean. Interannual variability is largely caused by westward propagating Rossby waves forced by Ekman pumping velocities east of the region. Seasonally, thermocline variability over the TRIO region is induced by a combination of local Ekman pumping and Rossby waves generated by winds from the east. Adjustment of the tropical SIO at both time scales generally follows linear theory and is captured by the first two baroclinic modes. Remote forcing from the Pacific via the oceanic bridge has significant influence on seasonal and interannual thermocline variability in the east basin of the SIO and weak impact on the TRIO region. On intraseasonal time scales, strong sea level and thermocline variability is found in the southeast tropical Indian Ocean, and it primarily arises from oceanic instabilities. In the TRIO region, intraseasonal sea level is relatively weak and results from Indian Ocean wind forcing. Forcing over the Pacific is the major cause for interannual variability of the Indonesian Throughflow (ITF) transport, whereas forcing over the Indian Ocean plays a larger role in determining seasonal and intraseasonal ITF variability.


2019 ◽  
Vol 53 (9-10) ◽  
pp. 5653-5673
Author(s):  
A. G. Nidheesh ◽  
Matthieu Lengaigne ◽  
Jérôme Vialard ◽  
Takeshi Izumo ◽  
A. S. Unnikrishnan ◽  
...  

2019 ◽  
Vol 186 (3) ◽  
pp. 666-672 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julian P Hume ◽  
David Martill

AbstractThe Aldabra rail, Dryolimnas cuvieri subsp. aldabranus, endemic to the Aldabra Atoll, Seychelles, is the last surviving flightless bird in the Indian Ocean. Aldabra has undergone at least one major, total inundation event during an Upper Pleistocene (Tarantian age) sea-level high-stand, resulting in the loss of all terrestrial fauna. A flightless Dryolimnas has been identified from two temporally separated Aldabran fossil localities, deposited before and after the inundation event, providing irrefutable evidence that a member of Rallidae colonized the atoll, most likely from Madagascar, and became flightless independently on each occasion. Fossil evidence presented here is unique for Rallidae and epitomizes the ability of birds from this clade to successfully colonize isolated islands and evolve flightlessness on multiple occasions.


Some years ago at the first and preliminary meeting of the Scientific Committee on Oceanic Research (S. C. O. R.) of the International Council of Scientific Unions (I. C. S. U.), one of the prime tasks was to seek some major international sea-going undertaking which the Committee could initiate and subsequently sponsor. This undertaking would have to interest many nations and embrace many oceanographical disciplines. The meeting took place at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and it was therefore appropriate (although not improbable!) that Dr C. H. O’D. Iselin should be first to suggest that an international research programme in the Indian Ocean fulfilled both these objects. He emphasized that many nations bordered it and that there were interests in this comparatively unknown ocean for any scientist concerned with meteorology, biology (above or below sea level), the physics and chemistry of the ocean waters, or the Earth beneath the sea. He also made clear that the monsoons made the Indian Ocean unique as regards oceanic and atmospheric circulation. The meeting, after lengthy discussion, endorsed Dr Iselin’s proposal and the end results of the tremendous international effort which thereby was created are now coming in. Some of these results were delivered at a Discussion Meeting held in the rooms of the Royal Society on 12 November 1964. The papers given at this meeting, and which are published below were restricted to geological and geophysical aspects of the northwest Indian Ocean (except for the first paper concerning the physiography of the whole of the Indian Ocean). This collection of papers represents, by no means, the last word on these aspects of this area. Indeed there is much more work to be published on experimental work already completed, and for many of us the work already accomplished has produced many new problems which require further experimental work in the area


2015 ◽  
Vol 112 (13) ◽  
pp. 3910-3915 ◽  
Author(s):  
Henry Wichura ◽  
Louis L. Jacobs ◽  
Andrew Lin ◽  
Michael J. Polcyn ◽  
Fredrick K. Manthi ◽  
...  

Timing and magnitude of surface uplift are key to understanding the impact of crustal deformation and topographic growth on atmospheric circulation, environmental conditions, and surface processes. Uplift of the East African Plateau is linked to mantle processes, but paleoaltimetry data are too scarce to constrain plateau evolution and subsequent vertical motions associated with rifting. Here, we assess the paleotopographic implications of a beaked whale fossil (Ziphiidae) from the Turkana region of Kenya found 740 km inland from the present-day coastline of the Indian Ocean at an elevation of 620 m. The specimen is ∼17 My old and represents the oldest derived beaked whale known, consistent with molecular estimates of the emergence of modern strap-toothed whales (Mesoplodon). The whale traveled from the Indian Ocean inland along an eastward-directed drainage system controlled by the Cretaceous Anza Graben and was stranded slightly above sea level. Surface uplift from near sea level coincides with paleoclimatic change from a humid environment to highly variable and much drier conditions, which altered biotic communities and drove evolution in east Africa, including that of primates.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Iyyappan Suresh ◽  
Jerome Vialard ◽  
Matthieu Lengaigne ◽  
Takeshi Izumo ◽  
Muraleedharan Pillathu Moolayil

<p>Remote wind forcing plays a strong role in the Northern Indian Ocean, where oceanic anomalies can travel long distances within the coastal waveguide. Previous studies for instance emphasized that remote equatorial forcing is the main driver of the sea level and currents intraseasonal variability along the west coast of India (WCI). Until now, the main pathway for this connection between the equatorial and coastal waveguides was thought to occur in the eastern equatorial Indian Ocean, through coastal Kelvin waves that propagate around the Bay of Bengal rim and then around Sri Lanka to the WCI. Using a linear, continuously stratified ocean model, the present study demonstrates that two other mechanisms in fact dominate. First, the equatorial waveguide also intersects the coastal waveguide at the southern tip of India and Sri Lanka, creating a direct connection between the equator and WCI. Rossby waves reflected from the eastern equatorial Indian Ocean boundary indeed have a sufficiently wide meridional scale to induce a pressure signal at the Sri Lankan coast, which eventually propagates to the WCI as a coastal Kelvin wave. Second, local wind variations in the vicinity of Sri Lanka generate strong intraseasonal signals, which also propagate to the WCI along the same path. Sensitivity experiments indicate that these two new mechanisms (direct equatorial connection and local wind variations near Sri Lanka) dominate the WCI intraseasonal sea level variability, with the “classical” pathway around the Bay of Bengal only coming next. Other contributions (Bay of Bengal forcing, local WCI forcing) are much weaker.</p><p>We further show that the direct connection between the equatorial waveguide and WCI is negligible at seasonal timescale, but not at interannual timescales where it contributes to the occurrence of anoxic events. By providing an improved understanding of the mechanisms that control the WCI thermocline and oxycline variability, our results could have socio-economic implications for regional fisheries and ecosystems.</p>


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