Spatial and temporal characteristics of the wind forcing of the Bering Sea

Abstract

The surface wind stress over the Bering Sea is estimated for the period 1946-90 from sea level pressure analyses, empirical relationships between the geostrophic wind and the surface wind, and a bulk aerodynamic formula. The stress at high frequencies (>0.1 cpd) is dominated by northward- and eastward-propagating disturbances with mean wavelengths of ~2500 and 10 000 km, respectively. At periods of ~10-100 days, the mean propagation is near zero: there are, however, significant interannual variations in the zonal propagation. Wind-driven ocean transports estimated by the Sverdrup method for the deep Bering basin account for ~6 Sv or roughly one-half of the observed transport within the western boundary current along the Kamchatka peninsula. -from Authors