Hey All!
Today during my discussion with Antonio of the layout of the playing field for Silbo and Challenger, Antonio pointed out something very interesting. The conditions that Silbo and Challenger are flying through are nearly symmetric!
As we fly away from South African waters, Challenger has found the trail of eddies that come from the Indian ocean, round the cape and shoot up into the South Atlantic Gyre, paving the road we plan on taking to the North East towards Brazil. The depth of the thermocline from the warm eddies in the area also follows a trend Silbo is seeing, where the eddies closer to shore have a deeper signature.
In the north, Silbo again is seeing similar instances with the depth of the thermocline within eddies, but is also seeing a similar trail. However this trail follows the equator and is formed from the interaction of the Northern and Southern Atlantic Gyres.
The salinity maps also have proven to be symmetric in the North and South Atlantic:
In the south, Challenger is flying away from a region of fresher waters from the upwelling event that has been fueling the plankton bloom we spoke about last week along the coast.
While up in the north, Silbo continues to inch forth towards the prominent Amazonian outflow which yesterday we pointed out causes the concentration of salt to decrease from 37 to 34.
Finally on the next surfacing, we are moving Challenger’s way point further to the north east from the current way point to make an attempt at flying more in a northern direction. With the way point signified by the red dot in the image below, Challenger has been flying due east. A heading that we are worried will not be enough to keep us from being sucked into the southern current created by the strong warm and cold eddy to our south and south west.
Force Wind Sea & Honor!