THE oceans are the driving force behind everything from hurricanes to El
Ni帽o鈥攜et there鈥檚 no global system to monitor them. But now
scientists in the US have received $9 million from the government to set
up Argo, a network of 3000 buoys that will make global ocean forecasting
possible for the first time.
In every cycle a buoy will sink to 2000 metres, drift for about 12 days, and
then rise back to the surface to beam readings of temperature, salinity and
currents to monitoring stations via satellite. Breck Owens, an Argo participant
from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts, says Argo will
help monitor salinity, which is thought to have played a major role during the
last El Ni帽o. 鈥淲e will see signals earlier, so we will forecast earlier,鈥�
he says.
The first buoys will be dropped in the equatorial Atlantic and Pacific by
April this year. However, funding hasn鈥檛 yet come through for the other
countries involved in Argo, which include Japan, Germany, France and Britain.
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