Atlantic Sensors to Warn of Gulf Stream Movements

An army of marine sensors and robot submarines may soon be deployed over the Atlantic able to provide an early warning of a failing Gulf Stream, which is an event that may bring about freezing in Britain.

The system that is to be deployed from the Canary Islands to Florida will cost 16 million pounds and has been named Rapid Watch. It will use latest technology to check if cold water from the melting ice sheets of the Arctic is diverting Gulf Stream off Britain.

Without the warm Gulf Stream, Britain may get very cold. Snowstorms and blizzards may occur all over the country. Ports may freeze over. Meric Srokosz is a scientist with Southampton Oceanographic Center. He says it is possible that the current Gulf Stream may change its course in say 10 years. This is what Rapid Watch is designed for - to study the Stream.

The Gulf Stream begins in the Mexican Gulf and flows through eastern US seaboard. Then it crosses the Atlantic on its way to Western Europe. The warmth that it carries brings Britain its characteristic temperate climate. Scientists have calculated an estimate that the Stream delivers 25,000 times the heat energy that all of Britain's power stations would supply.

Recently the current has been threatened by melting ice water from the Arctic. The Intergovernmental Climate Change Panel had made a warning about it last year. It has said that the current Gulf Stream is warm and salty but melting ice water joining the stream from the Arctic is likely to deteriorate it.

Studies of current measurements at various depths supplied data that indicated the Stream was really changing course. In 2004, Srokosz, with his colleagues Harry Bryden and Stuart Cunningham, created Rapid Watch, which is an array of sensors attached to the seabed. The sensors provide daily measurements of current flow. The results indicated that the ocean current does fluctuate in unpredictable ways.

The flow in the Gulf Stream varies between 4 million cubic meters each sec to 35 million. Rapid Watch will serve as a detection system when it starts operations this year. It will monitor the ocean current until 2014. Monitoring devices are to be attached to the ocean floor using cables. These instruments will then measure temperature and current flow at depths up to 6,000 meters.

Robot probes known as gliders that can operate up to depths of 1,000 meters will also study the Gulf Stream as the current rises and falls. Dr Srokosz added that it is indeed critical to find out the behavior of the Stream as it has an influence over our climate.